


closer than most

by tozierbraks



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King
Genre: M/M, but with some canon forgetting thrown in, just another college au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-15
Updated: 2019-04-14
Packaged: 2019-05-23 12:12:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 22,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14934062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tozierbraks/pseuds/tozierbraks
Summary: Richie was panting slightly when he reached out an arm and grasped the man’s shoulder a little too hard. He spun rapidly, stumbling backwards away from Richie, his deep brown eyes wide in shock.“Eds.” Richie breathed, his stomach twisting.Eddie’s wide eyes narrowed in confusion while his brows knitted downwards. He pulled his shoulder out of Richie’s grip“Sorry, do I know you?”college au + forgetting!eddie fic





	1. prologue

When Richie Tozier is four years old his mother brings him to the park. He plops down in the sand next to another boy quietly sorting small pebbles. On a nearby bench Maggie Tozier strikes up an easy conversation with Andrea Uris and from then on the boys are nearly as inseparable as their mothers, despite their oil and water personalities.  
  
When Richie is nine years old he barges brashly through the thick brush of the Barrens. He waves a stick through the thick branches in front of him and calls back to Stan to follow, throwing on a terrible Doc Brown impression. He promptly trips over a raised tree root and somersaults down the rest of the steep hill in front of him, catching himself on his palms that splash into the murky water at the bottom. He brings a hand to grasp at his glasses, groping around to check for any damage and thankfully finding none. Suddenly he hears a loud splashing noise and a shadow passes over him. He raises his wide eyes to see a gangly boy standing over him.  
  
“A-are you o-okay?” The boy asks, reaching a hand out to yank Richie back to his feet.  
  
“Never better!” he almost shouts, brushing mud off of his knees. More splashing alerts him to another boy approaching them cautiously. He is smaller, with neatly combed brown hair and pressed clothes. His hand clutches something in the pocket of his shorts tightly as he stands behind who Richie now recognizes as Bill Denbrough from first grade. Stan has caught up to him by now, and he and Bill nod at each other in polite recognition. From then on it’s not just Richie and Stan; it’s Richie, Stan, Bill, and Eddie.  
  
When Richie is thirteen years old shit starts to get weird real fast. First, Bill’s brother goes missing. Not a rarity in Derry but a little too close to home this time. Then when they go looking for him a kid named Ben Hanscom comes tumbling into their midst, bringing their numbers up to five. The very next day Beverly Marsh is shocking them all by leaping into the quarry water that Richie swears must be at least a thousand feet down. As if his head isn’t already spinning, next thing he knows they’re in a rock fight to the death against Henry Bowers and then Mike Hanlon is marching behind them and he doesn’t know why, but with them all here together Richie just feels _right_.  
  
As Eddie leads them out of the sewers, all of them covered in heavy layers of grime, Richie wills himself to believe that this is really over. They link hands and make a promise he hopes they’ll never have to fulfill.  
  
When he is fourteen they start high school as a pack, clinging together through the crowded hallways. Only a month after the encounter they are still a little shaky, but together they feel strong. They move on and actually begin to forget.

* * *

By sixteen Richie is convinced that the scariest thing that has ever happened to him is that he’s pretty sure the next time Eddie gets too close Richie is definitely going to kiss him because he’s got it that bad. And it’s not even his fault. Literally nothing could be cuter than that one little piece of hair that falls over Eddie’s forehead no matter how many times he huffs and tries to push it back. Or the way his nose scrunches up when he laughs, especially if it’s at Richie’s jokes. Or how whenever he’s tired he gravitates towards Richie so he can lay on his shoulder. How was Richie supposed to not be head over heels?

Luckily he doesn’t have to answer that question. Bill throws Eddie a birthday party late that summer and midnight finds Richie and Eddie in the backyard side by side in on a long abandoned swing set, twisting themselves lazily and talking about nothing in particular. Richie teases him lightly about how hard he worked to blow out his candles, but his tone is sincere when he asks,  
  
“So, whad’ja wish for, Eds?”  
  
Eddie fixes him a hard stare, his eyes darting between Richie’s own, searching for something. He must find it, because he leans over to crash their lips together, missing a little and landing half on Richie’s chin. Richie’s eyes go wide before slamming shut. He grips Eddie’s waist and awkwardly pulls him to stand between his legs, readjusting so their lips are properly slotted together. Eddie is the one to break it, pulling back to take a breath while resting his forehead against Richie’s. When their eyes meet they begin to laugh, giggling into their next kiss.  
  
Richie slides into seventeen happier than he has ever been. He spends his weeknights slipping into Eddie’s bedroom and his weekends crashing on Bill’s basement floor surrounded by all of his favorite people. He and Eddie clumsily learn their way around each other. Eddie learns that Richie is a bed hog while Richie learns that Eddie is a blanket hog. They learn how to fight and and how to make up. And, Richie’s favorite, they learn how to make each other fall apart. The first time they move together Richie peppers kisses to Eddie’s tightly scrunched face, whispering adorations that turn into dirty encouragements.  
  
That summer Bev’s aunt takes her out of state to visit her sister, they’re gone almost three months. The rest of the Losers are waiting for her when she gets back although they haven’t heard from her once. She steps out of the car and is nearly tackled to the ground with the force of their group hug. Only Stan refrained, so only Stan saw the brief look of confusion flash over her features before recognition dawned on her.

* * *

A month before his eighteenth birthday Richie’s world stops. Eddie barges into his bedroom on an otherwise typical Tuesday afternoon. He’s gasping for air and hiding his face in his hands. It takes Richie almost ten minutes just to get him sitting on the bed and breathing almost normally, he still has to pry Eddie’s fingers off of his face.  
“Eds, please, you gotta give me something.” Eddie only buries his face in Richie’s shoulder and concentrates harder on regulating his breathing. Richie brings a hand to grasp the back of his neck, rubbing gently with his thumb. With a final shudder Eddie sits up straight.  
  
“I’m m-moving.”

A cold pit lodges in Richie’s gut, weighing him down into the mattress.  
  
“What?”

“We’re going to live with my aunt.”  
  
“Bangor aunt?” Richie pipes up hopefully. Eddie shakes his head.  
  
“Kennebunk aunt.” Eddie’s voice cracks, another tear threatening at the corner of his eye. Richie pulls him down to lay on his chest and begins a series of rambling affirmations, how he’ll start saving for a car right away, how they’ll talk on the phone every night, how they’re almost old enough to be on their own anyways. By the time he finishes he’s almost convinced himself it’ll be okay. Eddie stays there that night, wrapped tightly into Richie’s side.

Twelve days later they’re loading the last of the Kaspbrak’s boxes into the van. Richie buries his face in Eddie’s hair and holds him tightly, not really giving a fuck about Sonia while he presses half hidden kisses there.  
  
“I love you, Eds,” he whispers. Eddie only nods furiously into his shoulder, digging his fingertips into Richie’s back. He pulls back from the hug and grabs onto the sides of Richie’s button down shirt, yanking him down into a brazen kiss. Richie hears Sonia’s dramatic gasp and almost laughs. Instead he just hikes Eddie’s thighs up around his waist and kisses him back, spinning in a tight circle. Eddie is giggling when Richie finally drops him back down.  
  
“Shit, Eds, that’s one way to do it.”  
  
Eddie shrugs.  
  
“She had to find out some time, guess I’ll be dealing with this conversation all the way down. I’ll call you tonight.” He takes another second to memorize Richie’s features before swinging the car door open and disappearing inside. He leans out the window to mouth a silent “I love you,” and then he’s gone.  

 


	2. one

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you guys for your feedback on the beginning of this, it's been so fun to write so far!  
> i swear not every chapter will be this short, this is just to get everything set up. <3

“Staanleeyy!” Richie’s loud whine carried down the short hallway between his own bedroom and Stan’s, inevitably dipping into Bill’s on the way.  
  
“Shut the f-fuck up, R-Richie.”  
  
“Make me.” Richie retorted, popping into Bill’s doorway. “Where’s Stan?”  
  
“H-how should I know?”  
  
“Useless! Completely useless!” 

He unfortunately did not find Stan anywhere in the house. Wandering into the small, brightly lit kitchen he dropped himself into a chair across from Mike at the table and held his head in his hands. Mike didn’t lower the newspaper he held in front of his face.  
  
“Two days into the semester Mikey, two days is all it took for Stan to ruin my life.”

“Why this time?”  
  
“Took my textbook.”

“Do you mean his textbook that he told you specifically he wasn’t going to be sharing with you?” Mike laughed, still not looking away from his paper.  
  
“The very same. Guess that means I can never do homework again for the rest of my life.” Richie dropped his chin onto his forearms crossed on the table. At that moment Bev strolled into the kitchen, her hair sticking out in odd angles at the back and one strap of her tank top slipping down her shoulder.  
  
“Damn, Marsh, I had you pegged as too much of a night owl to get it on this early. Kudos, Haystack!” Richie finished with a shout towards Ben and Bev’s shared bedroom. Bev flipped him off without turning around while she poured herself coffee. After a long gulp she turned to face them, leaning her back against the counter.  
  
“Like you’re one to give me shit about subtlety, you dirty talk like a bad porn star. I had my head buried under my pillow Saturday night.”  
  
“A bad porn star is still a star, my dear. And actually, my performances get rave reviews.” Bev snorted into her coffee but otherwise ignored him, disappearing back towards her bedroom.  
Richie leaned back in his chair and stretched his lanky limbs with an exaggerated groan. He swept his eyes over the kitchen and into the adjoining living room. Despite all the clutter Richie could never kick the feeling that the place felt a little empty. He leapt up suddenly, making Mike jump a little, and stormed back up the stairs to get dressed, determined to corner Stan at his favorite campus hideaway before their 10 AM.   
  
Early September had the UMaine campus wrapped in sweltering, humid air. It made Richie’s curls even wilder than usual as he jogged between the crowded parking lot he had left his car in and the small cafe tucked into the side of the campus center. The space was dark and almost always quiet, most students preferred the bright open space of the main center. Which is exactly why Stan Uris preferred the cafe. Richie spotted him immediately and ducked into the booth across from him. The textbook sat on the tabletop beside the planner Stan was scribbling in. Richie began to slowly slide his hand towards it, but was stopped in his tracks by Stan slamming down on it with his own.  
  
“I told you to get your own.”  
  
“And the chances of that were always slim to none.” Richie smirked, lacing their fingers together and causing Stan to yank his hand away. Seizing the opportunity Richie snagged the book, clutching it tightly to his chest and grinning maniacally.   
  
“So you’re just going to hold it, then?”

With a sinking feeling Richie realized he actually had no idea what he should be doing with the book now that he had it. He chanced a sideways glance at the syllabus poking out from under Stan’s things but Stan quickly shoved it underneath his other books.  
  
“Compromise, I can use the book under your direct supervision so it can’t disappear like the other ones.”  
  
“‘Disappear’ is a funny way of saying you lost them.”

“Nah, our place is haunted, I’m tellin’ you.”  
“By some pretty studious spirits, apparently,” Stan deadpanned. But Richie was nothing if not persistent. He stuck out his hand across the table.  
“Deal?” 

Stan fixed him with a hard stare, considering. He cautiously met Richie’s hand in a brief shake.  
  
“Fine, but you’re going to wake up early enough to give me a ride at least twice a week.”  
  
“Tough bargain, Uris. But you got it.”   
  
Stan begrudgingly slid the syllabus back out from under his stack of books and slid it towards Richie who scanned it quickly and flipped to the conclusion of the assigned chapter. Try as he might to stay focused on the anthropology anecdotes in front of him it was too tempting to scan the room. He had a bad habit of people watching, always with the itching feeling that he might be looking for someone.   
  
Even with four semesters under his belt Richie still rarely recognized anyone around campus. With 12,000 other students it was easy to pass off the masses as a distant crowd, hardly relevant to Richie and his tight inner circle. In high school a few of them had tossed around the idea of attending out of state colleges but the low price tag turned out to be too much of a draw so all together the Losers had piled into a couple of moving trucks and crammed themselves into a small five bedroom house, promising to get out of Maine together when it was all over. Two years in they still preferred to spend weekends holed up together or, if they were out, out together.   
  
9:45 came faster than Richie would have liked, and he trotted after Stanley across the quad to the social sciences building. The class was huge, an entry level course to fulfill some gen ed requirements. There were at least 300 other students stuffed into tiny desks that rose like bleachers. Richie made sure to sit on Stan’s right side so that if he decided to take any notes Stan would have to deal with his jabbing left elbow rather than a random stranger. He did manage to take down the title of the lecture, but after that most of his time was spent embellishing an especially curly ‘y.’   
  
He entertained himself with his imagination, daydreaming about his future comedy career, about what he would have for dinner that night, about the sex from last Saturday Beverly had apparently been third-wheeling from the floor below. He grinned to himself imagining her groaning into her pillow and cursing his name. The problem would only get worse if he got his way and they all ended up in New York City, inevitably squeezed into a much smaller space than they could afford here in northern Maine. Maybe by then Mike and Stan would have their shit together and they could go down a bedroom. Richie snorted at the thought and Stan gave him a curious look that he only waved off.

* * *

Richie had never been the type to pretend he was going to get his work done early or even on time in some cases. He was that kind of aggravating person who got seemingly effortless grades. No one ever really saw him do any work, but he always finished with a string of straight As. So even as he sat in the library with an hour to kill between classes he wasn’t actually using the time to do...anything. This turned out to be incredibly distracting for Bill who sat across from him and sent him quick glances every few minutes, just to make sure Richie was really wasting as much time as Bill thought he was.  
  
“R-Rich, what are you even d-doing here?”  
  
“Just here to look at your pretty face, Billy.”  
  
The question was straightforward enough, but Richie couldn’t really answer it. He knew why he was here in the library, it wasn’t worth it to go all the way back to their house between classes. But if Bill wanted to know why Richie was here at this university dragging his feet through a Communications degree he’s not really sure he could explain himself. When relatives asked he gave them the cookie cutter responses about good financial aid and communications being a broad enough field he could land all kinds of jobs with it. In truth even as he played the game, earned the credits, and kept on getting older Richie always felt like he was treading water, waiting for something he couldn’t put his finger on.  
When his thoughts started to circle too closely to this uncomfortable truth he searched for a distraction and landed on the notebook Bill was writing in.   
  
“New story?”   
  
Bill raised his eyes.  
  
“No, b-biology notes. We’re starting a g-group project today so I have to pick a few topics I might want to focus on.”   
  
"Gonna go for anatomy?" Richie drawled, wiggling his eyebrows.

"That one was l-lazy even for you, Tozier."

"You're right, I'm sure I'll get off some good ones during the semester, gotta warm my way into it."

"C-can't wait. But for n-now I'm off. You staying here?"

"Nah, nothing for me here without you." He slung his backpack over his shoulder and they made their way to the large double doors, shouldering through them and onto the wide granite staircase that led down to the campus quad, affectionately dubbed by the students as "the mall." Bill saluted a goodbye and took off across the grass.

Still in no rush, Richie tilted his head back towards the strong afternoon sun, the comforting warmth spreading through him to his fingertips. He started down the stairs, planning to meander his way across campus as slowly as he pleased.

But he froze as his gaze passed over a familiar head of brown hair, a little messier than he remembered but still unmistakable. He stood and gaped while his eyes followed the man’s slight frame across the grass of the quad. Before his mind could catch up to them his legs were carrying him forwards in a sprint. Richie was panting slightly when he reached out an arm and grasped the man’s shoulder a little too hard. He spun rapidly, stumbling backwards away from Richie, his deep brown eyes wide in shock.  
  
“Eds.” Richie breathed, his stomach twisting harshly.  
  
Eddie’s wide eyes narrowed in confusion while his brows knitted harshly downwards. He pulled his shoulder out of Richie’s grip.  
  
“Sorry, do I know you?”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> @tozierbraks on tumblr


	3. two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is such an angst bomb i'm so sorry
> 
> shoutout to the loml R @sunflowerstozier/killerqueer for beta-ing <3

It wasn’t until a harsh pounding began in his temples that Richie loosened his grip on his hair, letting his fist fall to his side. He spun sharply on his heel and continued pacing laps in front of the ratty living room couch where Bill, Ben, and Bev sat squeezed beside each other. Stan and Mike sat in the mismatched armchairs on either side of the sofa, blurs in Richie’s peripheral vision as he trained his eyes on the carpet.  
  
“Rich…” Bev began weakly.  
  
“I just don’t fucking get it, am I losing my fucking mind? Like, I’m here, right? You can all see me?” He began harshly patting himself down before bringing his hands up to stare at them.  
  
“Richie,” Bev spoke again, firmly. She stood and gripped his upper arms, turning him to face her. “Sit down.” He raised his eyes defiantly, but softened at Beverly’s light push, falling into the space she left between the two other men.  
  
It had been an hour since Richie had stumbled into the apartment, his head spinning. He had collapsed on his bed and replayed the moment a million different ways. He stayed that way until Bill tracked him down to ask about dinner plans. When he saw the slightly wild look in Richie’s eyes he had dragged him downstairs and called a family meeting.  
  
“Y-you’re sure it was-”

“Yeah Bill, pretty fuckin’ sure.” Bill caught his own retort before it spilled out, tightening his lips. Stan tried next.  
  
“Maybe you just took him by surprise.” Richie swallowed a deep breath before answering, his eyes squeezed shut.  
  
“You didn’t see his eyes, Stan. Totally blank. I mean, we already knew he didn’t give a shit anymore but this was dif-”  
  
“Don’t do that, Richie.” Bev interrupted, a determined look on her face. “Let me tell you something. All of you.” She paused to plan her next words. “Okay, this is going to sound crazy, but just hear me out. Remember the time I spent the summer at my aunt’s place?” It was a rhetorical question but a few of them actually nodded when she took a little too long to continue, chewing her bottom lip. “You’re not going to believe me, but while I was there, while I was gone, I almost forgot you guys. Like, when I got back and saw you all I was actually really confused. Just for a second. And when I wasn’t in Derry I don’t think I thought of anyone there once after the first few days. I’m sorry. I know it sounds totally nuts.”  
  
Soon Ben’s timid voice broke through the stunned silence.  
  
“It’s not crazy. It happened to me too, when I went to Kentucky with my mom for a couple weeks. Beverly called me and I almost didn’t recognize her voice. Even after that it all felt kind of hazy until I got back.” Everyone’s eyes bored into Ben’s face,  
  
“So what,” Richie croaked in a hoarse voice, “There’s some kind of black magic fucking with Eds?”

“Not magic,” Mike answered. “That fucking clown.” A chill passed through them, the air in the room becoming suddenly stale. Richie relaxed his fist, revealing deep indents where his nails had dug into his palm. Underneath he could still find the remnants of an old, barely there scar. He was hit with a flood of messy memories; Bill standing on the front porch at Neibolt, Stan freezing at the front door, Eddie’s broken arm. None of them had really forgotten, but they had pushed it away. Stan spoke next.  
  
“It couldn’t still be doing this to us. We killed it, right? And why Eddie and not us? We’re not technically in Derry anymore.”

“But we’re together.” Mike replied confidently. No one missed how he ignored Stan’s first question and no one repeated it. Richie growled between his fingers, his face pressed into his palms.  
  
“Are you fucking kidding me that this bullshit still isn’t over? What the fuck do we do about it? We can’t just leave Eddie out there. If it can fuck with his head like this who knows what else it can do. I know where he’ll be on Wednesdays now, I can find him and-”  
  
“S-Slow down, Rich.”  
  
“But-”  
  
“This is intense sh-shit, Richie. Bev and B-Ben were confused after a few m-months, Eddie’s been gone for t-two years. Trying to throw it all at him w-will probably freak him out.”  
The tension had left Richie’s shoulders, he was reduced to just a pleading gaze.  
  
“Bill, please, I have to try.”  
  
“He’s right,” Mike cut in. “Slow, until we can figure out more about where his head is.”  
  
Richie wanted to lash out, he actually searched for some sharp comeback. It would be easier to be angry than to realize that Mike was probably right. But it all fell short to the clawing hurt. With a curt nod he stood, allowing Bev to squeeze his hand as he passed her on his way back to his bedroom. He half expected her to follow but was relieved when he made it alone.

Now that the memories had started rushing in he couldn’t stop their momentum. They played unbidden on the inside of his tightly squeezed eyelids. The most persistent was a vivid thought of the first time Richie had snuck in through Eddie’s window. The night after they had kissed at Bill’s. Richie was still high on it, fidgeting uncomfortably under his comforter. It didn’t take long for him to fling it off and creep carefully down the stairs.  
  
Ditching his noisy car for his old bike Richie had sped down the pitch black Maine backroads until he skidded at the edge of the Kaspbrak lawn and dropped it unceremoniously behind a large bush nearby. Standing underneath Eddie’s window he realized just how little he had thought this through. He had been certain that the tree that stood just outside it had been much bigger than it was now in front of him. It had taken a little bit of luck and a lot of awkward shimmying to drag himself up to the very top of a precariously thin branch. When he leaned to tap on the window his stomach swooped as the branch moved down a little with his weight.  
  
“Richie?!” Eddie’s shocked face was worth all the risk, making Richie laugh so hard he almost finished the job of falling out of the tree. Instead, Eddie opened the window and yanked him through.  
  
“My hero,” Richie drawled, wrapping his arms around Eddie’s waist to pull them close together. Eddie flushed at the sudden contact, but draped his own arms loosely around Richie’s shoulders.  
  
“You could’ve died, you idiot.”  
  
“And it all would’ve been worth it.”  
  
Eddie snorted.

“For what? So you could see me look surprised while you fell to your death?”  
  
But for once Richie had had enough talking. He dove in to capture Eddie’s lips in a messy kiss, pushing him lightly back towards the bed. He spun them so he could sit down, pulling Eddie between his legs.  
  
“This is familiar,” Eddie mumbled against his lips.  
  
“Easier than killing my neck leaning so far down like that.” That earned him a small smack to his arm and a tight glare. Pushing his luck, Richie pressed a hand into the small of Eddie’s back. He responded immediately, melting a little more into Richie’s space and leaning in for another, slower kiss. His hands slid up Richie’s neck to rest in his hair, tugging a little when he got stuck in a stubborn knot. Richie broke away when he felt Eddie smiling against his lips.  
  
“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing, I just like your hair.” He began gently combing his fingers through it, his other hand returning to Richie’s shoulder. Richie preened under his affection, closing his eyes and letting his head fall to his shoulder.  
  
“So...should we maybe talk about this?” Eddie ventured cautiously.  
  
“What’s there to talk about?”  
  
Eddie rolled his eyes and froze his hand.  
  
“Y’know, all of this? I just,” he swallowed heavily. “I want to say that I like you, so if this is just kissing and...whatever to you I don’t think we should.”  
Richie grinned at Eddie’s obviously practiced outburst.

“You like me? You really _like_ like me? Gosh, Eds, I’m the luckiest girl in the world!” Eddie recoiled slightly, stepping almost out of Richie’s reach. His face fell a little before it began to twist into something almost angry.  
  
“You don’t have to be a dick ab-”  
  
Richie interrupted him by standing and grabbing his shoulders, pushing him to the bed and diving on after so they were face to face, Richie leaning his weight, his knees on the mattress between Eddie’s own.  
  
“Eddie, I _like_ like you so much. Times infinity.” He sealed the confession with a kiss, rolling onto his side and pulling Eddie with him. They had drifted off like that, Eddie’s fingers lazily twisting Richie’s curls until they were asleep.  
  
It was the ghost of that feeling keeping Richie up now, his chest feeling too light without the weight of Eddie’s face buried there. He slept face down that night.

* * *

By Thursday afternoon it was obvious to Richie that his friends were doing their absolute best to handle the situation, which meant very different things to each of them. He didn’t see Bill at all, he had holed himself up tightly and only left to head to his biology lab. Ben had greeted him first thing that morning with a pile of pancakes drenched in maple syrup and a sad smile. Bev was trying to pretend like everything was normal, tossing out jokes that had no chance of landing. Mike actually tried to bring it up again but Richie had dismissed him, not even a little ready for that. Stan was being very Stan about it, not raising the conversation but leaving plenty of silence to give Richie the opportunity to do it himself. He didn’t.

* * *

 

When his alarm when off on Friday morning Richie snoozed through a few times, definitely planning on skipping all three of his classes. Unfortunately he had forgotten that he shared the first one with Stan, their anthropology course that met three mornings a week. Stan at least had the consideration to turn what would normally be a loud banging on the door to a firm knock, but still didn’t wait for Richie’s answer before pushing the door open.  
  
“Let’s go. You promised me rides twice a week. You’re already falling behind.”  
  
Richie groaned and yanked his comforter over his head. Stan ignored him and pulled the curtains open.  
  
“I’ll be waiting downstairs in twenty minutes.”  
  
So Richie was downstairs in twenty-three, unshowered but at least in a clean shirt. At least, he hoped. Their short ride to campus was silent and they trooped into the huge lecture hall stiffly, Richie struggling to cram his long legs into the small space between the raised rows. Thanks to Stan’s meticulous internal clock they were still ten minutes early. Groggy students streamed in below them in various states of readiness. Richie had already laid his head down and was halfway back to sleep when Stan rested a hand between his shoulder blades.  
  
“Hey, Rich?”  
  
“Mm?”  
  
“Sit up for a second, I have to tell you something.”  
  
The tense tone of Stan’s voice had Richie sitting up quickly, whipping his head to face him. Stan met his eyes and simply pointed a few rows down. Richie rolled his eyes before he even followed Stan’s direction, knowing what he would inevitably find. Because why wouldn’t this happen? Eddie sat there, staring determinedly down at his notes while tapping his pencil nervously on the notebook.    
  
“Awesome,” he said flatly. He looked back to Stan for his response but only found him staring wistfully towards Eddie. After a long silence he turned to Richie.  
  
“This really hurts.”  
  
With anyone else Richie would probably have been furious. No shit, it hurts. Try having been in love with him, that shit fucking hurts. This was Stan, though, and Richie knew that part went unsaid. He was simply stating a fact.  
  
He was also echoing Richie from a conversation held three years ago. A month after Eddie had left Richie moping in his empty driveway Richie sat in Stan’s bedroom, his face dramatically buried in the crisp white sheets.  
  
“This really fucking hurts.”  
  
“Maybe it’s his mother. You could never put it past her to cut him off.”  
  
“Doesn’t make it any easier.”

“Of course it does, it’s completely different if she doesn’t want him talking to us than if he doesn’t want to.”  
  
It had been exactly seventeen days, six hours, and thirty-two minutes since Richie had heard Eddie’s voice. For the first four days Eddie had called religiously every night at eight. Their conversations had grown a little shorter, but as Eddie settled in there was just less to tell, no big deal. Then the calls started to stagger later and later and Eddie was hanging up faster every time. By the tenth day no call came at all. On the eleventh Richie called first, and had kept it up for the next six. On the eighteenth no one answered.  
He knew Stan was probably right, but there had been something so distant about Eddie’s voice in the last few phone calls it just didn’t sit right that it was all Sonia. Still, he held onto that for the rest of senior year anyways. He convinced himself that after graduation Eddie would somehow be free of her, replaying the memories of Eddie clinging to his shirt in frustration and cursing her while Richie pulled him tight and made promises of their life together beyond Maine.

So Richie made sure he wasn’t too far away from where Eddie had left him. It didn’t matter though, despite leaving strict orders with his parents to tell Eddie where he was if he ever called, Richie never heard from him. Now he sat in a too-small desk at a school he couldn’t really care less about staring at the back of Eddie’s head. And it still really fucking hurt.  
Something must have show on his face because just then Stan spoke up softly beside him.  
  
“You know it wasn’t his fault, right? Mike was right. It was the clown. It probably still is,” he finished with a slight shudder.  
  
“Yep.” Richie snapped, keeping his lips tight. He knew better than to let it spill out, but inside he was seething. Who fucking cares whose fault it was? He still spent the last three years desperately trying and failing to forget Eddie. Great, they had an explanation, but in that moment Richie could only remember all the time he would never get back spent stewing on questions; Was Eddie safe? Was he happy? Why now? Or, the most insistent, why wasn’t Richie enough anymore? Only recently had these thoughts started to subside. He had started to find some kind of closure in the fact that he would never have any. And now, this.  
  
Stan didn’t try to talk to him again and Richie spent the class pointedly staring anywhere but at Eddie, hating the way he still felt his fingers itching to run through his thick wavy hair.

* * *

 

That night music pounded through the shitty speaker system at the front of the Losers’ living room, pouring over the small groups of students scattered around the room. Mike sat on the arm of the couch with his legs planted on the cushions so that Stan could lean on his shins to talk to some of their guests, but otherwise Richie didn’t see any of his friends amongst the crowd. That afternoon he had decided that tonight was a party night and loudly proclaimed so as he slammed several large bottles of whiskey onto their kitchen counter. So all seven of them had sent out their meager invitations, which still ended up being a solid amount of people between them.  
  
Four strong drinks in Richie was getting lost in the beat and the loud din of conversation around him, letting it all suffocate him.  
  
“Come on, Stanny, dance with me,” he slurred as he grabbed Stan’s hand and twirled him up to his feet. He tried to drag him into the center of the small room but ultimately failed no matter how hard he pulled.  
  
“Buzz off, I was comfortable,” Stan grumbled and returned to his seat. Luckily Bev was there to save the day, popping up behind Richie and wrapping her arms around his waist. He was suddenly (drunkenly) so grateful for her, not only for being here to dance with him but for her entire existence. He held her face in his hands and told her so, smacking kisses to her cheeks.  
  
“I’m pretty sure you’re the love of my life Beverly Marsh, marry me?” She only giggled and offered the last big swig of her drink which he took gladly. They had been joined by most of the other partygoers by then, someone had shoved the coffee table aside and cranked the music even higher so the dim room became a small dance floor. As Bev spun away from him to join a group of her friends nearby Richie looked around the room to find his next victim. He found Stan and Mike now face to face on the couch, and that was a lost cause. Through the kitchen doorway he saw Bill leaning against the counter and talking to a pretty redhead, another hopeless case.

The front door opening caught his eye and he grinned. _Perfect_. The young man that walked through the door had taken Psych with Richie last year, Dylan something or other. They weren’t exactly friends, but they got along great in these loud, dark, spaces and even better in Richie’s bedroom. He was Richie’s favorite late night text. Richie moved quickly to approach him and pull him into the crowd, immediately gripping onto his waist and pressing their hips together. They smiled at each other and Richie admired his high cheekbones, his wide brown eyes.

Suddenly something twisted in Richie’s stomach. Chalking it up to alcohol, he dove in to press kisses to the shorter man’s neck. It pulled a high, breathy gasp that echoed somewhere far in Richie’s mind. Frustrated by the harsh, tugging pain in his chest Richie spun the man around and began grinding forward into him, closing his eyes and learning into the feeling. When he opened them the air punched out of his stomach as he looked down to his partner and saw an almost familiar head of brown hair. His hands tightened on the man’s small frame just long enough to shove him away. With a barely there nod of apology Richie was taking the stairs two at a time, barely making it to his bedroom before he doubled over in gasping sobs.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> @tozierbraks on tumblr


	4. three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We're leaving some of the cloud of angst. <3
> 
> SMCC = Southern Maine Community College but no one up here would call it that to each other haha

For as long as he could remember Richie never really got all the commotion about Maine. All the Derry bullshit aside he still couldn’t imagine clambering up here like the tourists did in droves just to see some leaves or sleep in a tent on the ground. Tonight, though, he almost thought he understood. Sitting on the banks of the Kenduskeag River with Eddie’s back snuggled into his chest, he would swear that the green of the trees was brighter, that the warm air was sweeter. Yeah okay, maybe this place could be pretty great.  
  
He picked up a smooth pebble and flung it from where they sat, watching it skip twice before dipping below the water. Eddie opened his eyes to look for the source of the noise, finding his answer in the spreading ripples. He turned his cheek to Richie’s chest and hummed a content sigh when Richie kissed his temple, keeping his lips pressed there.  
  
“Can we stay here forever?” Eddie’s voice was thick and sleepy, it made Richie’s heart melt a little.  
  
“You don’t really want that, Eds.”  
  
“Who says?”  
  
“You, mostly,” Richie snorted. “So, no. We can stay right here for now, though. And then next year we’ll find somewhere to stay forever.” At that Eddie sat up and stretched, grinning when Richie pouted and reached out towards him. He relieved Richie’s worry by turning around and resettling himself, this time straddling Richie’s thighs and leaning in to press their foreheads together.  
  
“Somewhere where home is better than sitting at the river.”  
  
Richie suddenly stuck his pinky finger in the air and waved it in Eddie’s confused face.  
  
“Pinky promise,” he declared, as if it should have been so obvious. Eddie rolled his eyes but wrapped his own finger around Richie’s.  
  
“Edward F. Kaspbrak, I pinky promise to make our house your favorite place in the entire world. No matter how many chocolate chip pancakes I have to make or how many scented candles I have to buy.” Eddie was laughing as he shut Richie up with a kiss, threading the rest of their fingers together.  
  
“Just be there, that’s all I need.”  
  
“Well that I can do, you weren’t gettin’ rid of me that easy, Spaghetti.”  
  
“And maybe a giant bathtub. To put the candles next to.”  
  
“Woah okay, spoiled much?”  
  
Eddie shoved on Richie’s chest until he was lying flat on his back and smirked at his surprised expression.  
  
“I think you’ll like the bathtub even better than I do,” he murmured, grinding his hips down lightly from where he sat perched on top of Richie. Richie groaned, squeezing his eyes shut and gripping Eddie’s thighs.  
  
“Do that again and I’ll get you a hundred bathtubs,”

Eddie giggled and rolled over on his side, tangling his fingers in Richie’s hair as they kissed.

* * *

That had all come to Richie’s mind just because someone had left the shower just a tiny bit on and it was dripping heavy drops into the tub, making loud plopping noises like the pebble he had skipped on the river. That and the fact that he had heard a laugh earlier from downstairs that was startlingly similar to Eddie’s, his mind was playing tricks on him. Finally deciding that an hour was plenty of time wasted on wallowing, he swung his feet to the floor and stretched his arms with a loud grunt.

Ten years of friendship meant that none of the group really gave a shit in front of each other anymore, so Richie galloped down the stairs in nothing but his boxers and a ratty t-shirt, his hair a disheveled mess. He grabbed the bottom of the stair railing and swung himself towards the kitchen to look for a still half full pot of coffee. What he found instead froze him in the doorframe, his hand clutching it tightly.  
  
Eddie sat at the kitchen table with Bill, both with half-empty mugs in front of them and a messy pile of papers between them. Richie snapped his jaw shut from where it had fallen open and looked to Bill for an explanation.  
  
“H-hi, Rich,” he began cautiously, eyeing Richie like a ticking bomb. When Richie didn’t respond, his lips pulled into a tight line, he continued. “This is E-Eddie Kaspbrak. My bio lab partner.”

Richie tried to turn his scoff into an exaggerated fake cough, covering too much of his face with his elbow. He kept his arm up as he let his eyes roam over Eddie. His face was almost exactly as Richie remembered it, but with an extra smattering of freckles. His hair was a little shorter and more carefully styled and his clothes showed more intention, he was clearly putting in some effort now with a well fitted blue button up and pale blue jeans. Richie suddenly felt very self-conscious of his own “outfit” and crossed his arms over his chest.  
  
“You didn’t tell me you had a bio lab partner,” he nearly hissed at Bill.  
  
“I h-haven’t really seen you since it happened.”  
  
“That’s funny considering I liv-”  
  
Bill cut him off with a glare and one look at Eddie’s confused expression convinced him to give it up for now. He sighed and let his arms fall to his sides.  
“Well, nice to meet you Eddie Kaspbrak. Short for Edward, I assume? Maybe Edmund? Eduardo?”  
  
“Eddie, th-this is Richie Tozier, our resident dumbass.”  
  
Eddie laughed and waved off Bill’s retort, turning to Richie. It was the first time their eyes had met since Richie had grabbed him outside of the library, and it made Richie’s stomach twist into knots.  
  
“It’s Edward.”  
  
“Gotcha, Edward F. Kaspbrak.”  
  
Bill’s eyes shot open wide behind Eddie and he silently mouthed curses at Richie who immediately realized his mistake. Eddie was looking downright dumbfounded.

“How did you know my midd-”  
  
“Lucky guess!” Richie blurted, his voice pitched uncomfortably high.  
  
Eddie kept his eyes squinted and searched Richie’s face slowly.  
  
“...are you the guy who talked to me on the quad the other day?”  
  
_Shitshitshit._ Lying wasn’t really going well so Richie decided to just tell the truth. Sort of. He scratched at the back of his head and stared at the floor.  
“Uh, yeah. I thought...actually it’s because you’re in my anthropology class!” he finished a little too confidently. _Nice save, Tozier_. “I was trying to get some notes. Sorry I freaked you out.”  
  
“Oh. Okay.”

Bill had his face buried in his palms and Richie couldn’t be sure if he was miserable or laughing. Probably both, he decided. Desperate for a distraction, Richie busied himself with grabbing a mug, being extra picky in choosing one. He kept his back to them as he poured out a cup of old coffee. When he finally turned it was to see Eddie still looking at him curiously.  
  
“Wanna take a picture, Eds?”  
  
But Eddie’s questioning stare didn’t waver.  
  
“You called me that the other day, too.” Richie’s jaw tightened under the scrutiny, he dug for an easy excuse.  
  
“Probably, nicknames are kinda my thing. Well, that and being really, really ridiculously good looking.”  
  
Eddie’s face finally relaxed into a scoff.  
  
“Yeah whatever, Richie Tozier. Or is it Richard?”  
  
“It’s whatever you like, sweetheart,” Richie teased, shocking even himself with how easily the flirtation flowed off his tongue. Eddie rolled his eyes and turned back to Bill, pulling some of the biology notes closer to him. Bill himself had collapsed into a heap on the table, his face planted in his forearms. On his way out of the kitchen Richie kneed him lightly in the side which Bill returned with an elbow to his ribs.

He only actually made it as far as the couch in the next room before collapsing, giving in to the intense gravity that had been weighing in his gut since he had heard Eddie say his name for the first time in two years. He laid back and balanced his coffee on his chest before grabbing the nearest book ( _Introduction to Agronomy: Food, Crops, and Environment_ ) and leaning it against his folded knees. His eyes blankly skimmed the pages while he trained all of his attention on listening to Bill and Eddie chatter about things he couldn’t really care less about.  
  
When Eddie finally left about an hour later Bill followed him to the door and waved him off. Then he spun on his heel and fixed Richie with a flat, unimpressed look.  
  
“Smooth, Rich.”  
  
“No way is this on me. You bring him in here without telling me and now you wanna give _me_ shit? Nu-uh.” He tried to keep his tone neutral but an edge of anger was threatening to bite through.  
  
“It was last minute, I t-tried to t-tell you last night but I couldn’t find you.”  
  
“Whatever, Denbrough.”  
  
Something snapped in Bill’s jaw and he stalked towards the couch, stopping just in front of Richie who sat up and glared defensively up at him.  
“He was my best f-fucking friend Richie. For eighteen f-fucking years. Stop pushing us out, pretending like you’re al-alone in this, and get back on our fucking side. W-we’re going to get him back, but we have to do it t-together.”  
  
Before Richie could respond a nearby door cracked open and they both turned to watch Bev stride to the couch, settling herself beside Richie and pulling Bill down on her other side. Richie leaned into her, laying his head on her shoulder while she ran her fingers through his hair.  
  
“He’s right, Richie. It has to be all of us together. It always has.”  
  
Richie sighed, looked to Bill, and nodded. He stretched himself back out the couch, his head landing on Bill’s thigh while his long torso fell across Bev. They sat in silence for a long moment before Bev grinned, eyeing Richie’s abandoned reading material.  
“So Rich, what can you tell me about food, crops, and the environment?”

* * *

Although Bill and Richie’s argument had started to chip away at the tension in the house, it still only really scratched the surface. So, tired of people tiptoeing around him, Richie called a family meeting. They ended up scattered around the living room on Sunday evening listening to Bill as he sat in one of the armchairs and recounted his morning with Eddie.  
  
“We w-were right, he doesn’t remember anything about D-Derry, but he knows he lived there. I t-told him we were from there too, figured we had to start somewhere, and he b-barely thought it was weird that we didn’t know each other. He did seem a l-little uncomfortable about it though so I b-backed off.”

“So we’re starting from scratch,” Ben began slowly, “but where do we even go from there?”

Richie found himself looking to Mike, and a quick sweep of the room showed him that everyone else was too.  
  
“I never read anything about this, we’re in new territory, I think,” he murmured, averting his eyes from their expectant looks. So they looked to Bill next. Mike was wise when he was confident, but faltered without logic and knowledge to back it up. Bill was confident even when it wasn’t wise, and they were in need of a Big Bill style caution-to-the-wind plan. He slid into his role as their leader easily, nodding once and speaking with conviction.  
  
“I i-invited him over after class on Tuesday. I think w-we should all try to be there. So far he’s only seen me and R-Richie. Let’s s-start by all getting reacquainted. Or acquainted, I guess. H-Hopefully you all handle it smoother than Richie did,” he paused to dodge the pillow being tossed at him but continued without otherwise missing a beat. “I told him six o-clock, is that d-doable?” With a chorus of “yep, yes, mm-hmm,” it was decided.

* * *

Richie’s alarm buzzed bright and early on Monday but he was already up, slamming his hand down to shut it off before flinging himself out of bed and towards the shower. He borrowed a little of Stan’s fancy body wash and a little of Bev’s nice shampoo, justifying it with a quick thought of _it’s a Monday, I need this_. After turning his face up under the hot water long enough to feel refreshed he jumped out and slung a towel around his waist. He used another to start drying his hair.  
  
Standing in front of the sink to brush his teeth he couldn’t help but notice just how wild he had let his hair grow. He began combing his fingers through it, snagging a bit of Bill’s gel to tame his curls out of his face. A loud banging on the door pulled him out of his fixated concentration and he almost slipped backwards when he jumped, the towel falling from his hips.  
  
“Tozier, get the fuck out,” Bev’s annoyed grumble sounded through the door. With a final glance in the mirror he obliged, holding the towel up in front of himself as he slipped past her and placed a kiss to her cheek on his way back to his bedroom. He stood in front of the large wardrobe that took the place of a closet and sifted through his options. It had been a while since he revisited most of his clothing, mostly he recycled through the same few shirts that traveled from the floor of his bedroom to the washing machine and back.  
  
His hand caught on a faded denim jacket, his finger poking through a threadbare spot on the elbow. _Fuck it_ , he thought, yanking it off the hanger and pulling it on over an old Clash t-shirt. He grabbed his backpack and was halfway out his door before a breeze on his thighs made him look down. No pants. Sighing dramatically for no one particular he grabbed his favorite black jeans from the floor and hopped into them as he made his way down the stairs.

Stan was already waiting for him, Richie had expected nothing less. He peered over the newspaper held in front of him, his eyebrows raised in surprise as he shifted his eyes between Richie and the clock, 8:58.  
  
“Let’s go, Staniel! Can’t be late for anthropology!”  
  
“Richie, sit down. Eat something. I’m not sitting in those cramped seats for an extra hour.”  
  
“Oh so when _you_ want to leave early we go but…” Richie complained, trailing off as he dumped some Frosted Flakes into a bowl and sat across from Stan. Bev popped into the kitchen soon after, tossing some toast in and pouring coffee into her travel mug from the pot that Stan made every morning.  
  
“Looking good, babe,” she called over her shoulder to Richie as she finished her whirlwind through the kitchen, slinging her bag over her shoulder and hurrying out the front door, toast in hand. Richie hummed an acknowledgement through a mouthful of cereal but she was long gone. Stan was still reading, taking his time to skim the politics section too thoroughly for Richie’s liking. His foot tapped impatiently on the floor until Stan lowered the paper, glaring.  
  
“Fine, let’s go.”

* * *

They had left the house at 9:12 and arrived on campus at 9:18. They were sitting uncomfortably in their seats by 9:26. While Stan perused the week two syllabus Richie’s eyes darted to the door. To his surprise it creaked open at 9:30, Eddie’s head peeking through. He took in the empty hall, his eyes landing briefly on Richie and Stan. He also looked surprised to see them as he lingered in the doorway fiddling with his bag strap. He started to walk up the stairs and paused at his usual row. Richie tried to ignore the tinge of disappointment and glanced down at his notebook, only now realizing how hard he had been staring.

He was working so hard not to notice Eddie that he actually jumped at the noise of a bag being dropped onto the floor next to him, followed by Eddie sliding himself into the seat at his side.  
  
“Hey,” Eddie began timidly but Richie couldn’t help but interrupt him, overwhelmed by their sudden closeness.  
  
“Kaspbrak! I thought you were gonna blow me off, like our breakfast date never even happened. Should’ve known you’d be back for more.”  
  
Eddie rolled his eyes and moved to pick up his bag, smirking.  
  
“Well then maybe I should just leave, wouldn’t want to feed your ego.” Richie’s hand shot out instinctively to grab Eddie’s wrist and he almost flinched at the heat that ran up his arm at the simple touch. Eddie froze and stared down at where Richie’s fingers wrapped around him before pulling back suddenly and holding his own wrist, his eyes a little wide.  
  
“Sorry,” Richie mumbled.  
  
“S’okay.”  
  
Beside Richie Stan cleared his throat and Richie could almost kiss him for the distraction.  
  
“Oops, Eddie, this is Stan. Stan, Eddie Kaspbrak.” Eddie’s name still felt funny and unfamiliar on Richie’s tongue.  
  
“Nice to meet you, Eddie.” He held out his hand and shook Eddie’s professionally, even Richie was almost convinced Stan was meeting a stranger. Eddie smiled back at Stan and Richie couldn’t take another second of that smile being beamed at anyone else.  
  
“So, Eds, I can’t figure you out. Anthropology and biology? Trying to study the diverse cultures of germs? Oh, that was funny. Get it germs? Cul-” Stan slapped a hand over his mouth and looked at Eddie for his answer.  
  
“Catching up on my gen ed requirements, I finished most of them at my old school but there were a couple that this place is picky about.”  
  
“Your old school?” Stan prompted.

“Yeah, I did two years at SMCC, my mom thought it would be good to save money that way. I don’t think she actually thought I would head up here when I finished so jokes on her I guess.” Richie darkened a little at the mention of Sonia. He couldn’t technically blame her anymore for Eddie leaving him but he still had plenty of good reasons to hate her. He had spent the better part of six years watching and supporting Eddie as he grew into the realization that she was trying her best to trap him permanently in her web.  
  
He had wanted so badly to be the one to save Eddie, to take him far away from Derry where she couldn’t get her claws in him. He thought back again to their conversation on the river bank and the hundreds of others they had had like it. It made him feel helpless to remember Eddie driving out of Derry and, unknowingly, away from the circle of friends he often pulled his strength from. He hadn’t kept his promise, Eddie had escaped Derry but never escaped home.  
  
But clearly Eddie didn’t really ever need Richie or any of the other Losers to save him. He was sitting here next to Richie three hours away from her, not nearly far enough in Richie’s opinion, but a good start. He grinned to himself imagining Eddie, strong, stubborn Eddie Kaspbrak slamming the door in Sonia’s face on his way to get up to boring Orono, Maine of all places. He turned his grin on Eddie, pride radiating from him as he tuned back in to the conversation just in time to hear Eddie explain that he is continuing his degree in mechanical engineering and living on campus with a less-than-desirable roommate.  
  
“He’s super messy and rude and I just don’t think he’s okay with me being…” he paused. “With me being me, I guess.”  
  
“Sounds like you’ll just have to spend all your time with us,” Richie chided, nudging him with his shoulder. It earned him another smile as Eddie laughed back.  
  
“Yeah, I guess so.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay the setup is finally done! let me know what you think!


	5. four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay i feel kinda blah about this one, hopefully it all makes sense!

The atmosphere in the room was tense. Bill spouted a stream of curses at Beverly who responded with a lightning quick flash of her middle finger. Mike sat with his brow furrowed, his hands gripped almost into fists. Ben was mumbling angrily to himself, his eyes staring straight ahead. Stan was the only one who looked almost calm, but the twitching corner of his frown was still giving him away. Only Richie was relaxed, hooting encouragements to pit everyone against each other.  
  
The tension gave away to a loud chorus of groans as Stan’s kart flew past the finish line, earning him first place. The others came in behind him, Ben trailing behind an NPC.  
“Fuck off, Uris. Maybe let someone else win,” Bill whined, tossing his controller to the couch beside him.  
  
“Just get better,” Stan shot back, standing and stretching. Before Bill could respond a solid knock sounded on the door and he jumped up to open it. Eddie stood there with a six pack of cheap beer, wrapped in a too-big sweatshirt against the beginning autumn chill. The wind had blown one of his loose curls over his forehead. He gave a small wave as Bill ushered him into the living room, already beginning the remaining introductions.  
  
“That’s Beverly over there, Ben is sitting next to her, and Mike is the one in the armchair.” Eddie smiled politely and moved to shake Bev’s hand but she jumped up, her eyes wide, and pulled him into a tight hug. She pulled back but kept her hands gripping his upper arms. Her eyes traveled up and down his small frame, her mouth hanging open a little. Thankfully Ben interrupted, clearing his throat purposefully and giving Bev a warning look. He took Eddie’s hand and re-introduced himself.  
  
Mike stood from his seat and took his cue from Ben, so far the most successful in keeping a straight face even as his hand gripped Eddie’s just a little longer than was natural. Richie, meanwhile, had been rendered nearly useless. Something about seeing Eddie back here, all seven of them together, completely overwhelmed him. It only got worse when Eddie chose the seat on the couch next to him.  
  
“Hi, Richie.”  
  
There were plenty of good options for answering him: “Hi, Eddie.” “Good evening.” “How are you?” Richie went with none of them.

“Your hair is a little messed up,” he blurted.  
  
“Huh?” Eddie’s eyes flicked upwards while he brought a hand up to find the loose end.

“Oh, uh, thanks.” He tried to push it back into place but it continued to fall stubbornly. He gave up with a shrug, curling his hands into the sleeves of his red hoodie and turning to answer Mike asking if he had found the place okay. Richie stared shamelessly, noticing a few new freckles dusted across the bridge of Eddie’s nose.  
  
“Richie,” Bev’s voice nearly yelled from the across the room. He jerked his head to face her. Her expression told him that was not the first time she had tried to get his attention. She gestured towards the kitchen with a wink. He vaulted himself towards her, answering Eddie’s confused look with a rushed “drink run.” When he walked into the kitchen Bev grabbed his arm to pull him in further and slammed the door.  
  
“He’s so cute!” she squeaked.  
  
“Don’t need to tell _me_ ,” Richie snorted.

“Okay.” She shoved at his arm. “But I actually brought you in here to split you up for a second. You were leaning towards him like you were gonna kiss him.”  
  
“Can you blame me? He’s pretty fuckin’ kissable, Bev.” She studied him for a long moment.  
  
“What’s your game plan, Rich?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Well, do you want to be with him again?”’  
  
“I think so. I mean, I know I do. But I also don’t. I guess I don’t really know him anymore and he definitely doesn’t know me. But I’m pretty sure that if he walked into a room as a stranger I’d still be super into him.”  
  
“He’s still Eddie, Richie...” she prodded.  
  
“And I still love him,” he admitted quietly. She took one of his hands in hers and waited patiently for him to continue.  
  
“But I don’t think I could do it with him like this, with him not knowing. It’s too weird, it would just feel wrong somehow. So I’ll wait until we figure out how to fix it.”  
“And what if we never do?” Bev nearly whispered. Richie grimaced.  
  
“Let’s deal with that if we get there.”  
  
She nodded.

“In the meantime, what if he finds you as kissable as you find him?”  
  
“Not possible.”  
  
“He did once.”  
  
“I’ll be strictly professional, on my best behavior,” he rose his hand in a makeshift salute.  
  
“No you won’t,” Bev grinned, snagging a few beers from the fridge and ushering them both back into the living room.

They found the others mostly as they had left them, Eddie, Mike, and Ben were still chatting as they each held SNES controllers in their hands while the fourth lay on the couch cushion beside Eddie.  
  
“There you are, Rich,” Ben said. “It’s your turn, we were waiting.”  
  
“Hold your horses, Haystack, I’m coming.” He plopped down and turned to the screen ready to choose a character. But he was already locked into Yoshi, his long-time favorite. “Thanks for getting me all set up to kick your ass, Ben.”  
  
“It wasn’t me,” Ben said, smiling at him. “Eddie did it.” Richie turned to Eddie, dramatically raising one eyebrow in confusion.  
  
“How’dya know, Eds?”  
  
“Just had a feeling,” Eddie shrugged. Richie wrapped his arm around Eddie’s shoulder and ruffled his hair.  
  
“Well okay then, it’s on!”

Two hours later the room had become scattered with beer cans and at least two empty bottles of wine. The game had been abandoned but the character select music still blared as they chattered animatedly. Eddie had opened up considerably with a few drinks, and he was sitting sideways on the couch arguing with Bill about whether or not _Batman Forever_ was a good movie. Richie was glad to see that his fiery energy had just been hidden, not gone. He was vaguely aware of Stan and Mike on his right side continuing a conversation he was technically a part of, but the slight pink tinge of Eddie’s cheeks proved to be much more captivating and he twisted his body towards him, his chest nearly pressing against Eddie’s back.  
  
He downed the rest of his drink and tossed the can away, his head swimming just enough to make him feel a little loose. Bill caught his eye over Eddie’s shoulder and grinned, not for any particular reason except that that’s what you do when you catch your best friend’s eye and you're both buzzed. But it was enough to cause Eddie to turn his head, putting his face and, more importantly, his lips almost against Richie’s cheek.  
  
  
“Hey there,” Richie breathed, trying and failing to sound casual. Thankfully Eddie mostly ignored him, waving him off and turning back to Bill. Richie tuned into the buzz of the room, feeling literally warm and fuzzy at the energy that radiated from them all being in a room together. If this was three years ago he would have wrapped his arms around Eddie’s waist and smacked a kiss to his cheek. Eddie would wipe it off with a disgusted noise, but he would lean back into Richie anyways and probably lace their fingers together where Richie’s hands rested in Eddie’s lap. They would settle in to sleep on the couch in Bill’s basement wrapped up together, probably sneaking off to shove their hands down each others’ pants before trying and failing to get back to bed without waking at least two of the others.

Richie braced himself for the pain of the vague memory, but was surprised to find that although it did hurt he could still breathe. It had faded a little from a deep stabbing to more of an intensely aching bruise. The hardest part was ignoring the muscle memory sending a sensation straight to his hands telling him to pull Eddie close. He settled for leaning forward and rested his chin on Eddie’s shoulder, ignoring Bev’s warning glance. He felt Eddie tense a little but, realizing it was just Richie, he relaxed and Richie could have sworn he even leaned back just a little bit.

* * *

Anthropology had started to go by way too fast, in Richie’s opinion. He swore he had barely dropped his bag beside Eddie’s before he was picking it up again and walking with Stan and Eddie out of the stuffy building and into the bright morning. It had been a week since they had all hung out which meant he had seen Eddie three times, once per class. Each time he was finding it harder to cling to the resentment that had exploded in him in the beginning. Instead, he was starting to give in to the bubbling excitement he felt every time he marched into that lecture hall. Still, thinking back on his promise to Bev, he realized it was probably safer that their time together was contained so he didn’t pull something stupid the next time Eddie flashed those big brown eyes at him.

“Sound good, Richie?” Stan’s voice cut into his daydream.  
  
“Hm? Probably, but just in case, remind me again what you just said.”  
  
“You, me, and Eddie as a group for this project?”  
  
“Aye aye, captain,” he agreed easily.  
  
“Okay,” Eddie said. “I’m off this way,” he pointed his thumb over his shoulder, “but should I call you or something?”  
  
“Join us for lunch,” Stan replied, “we always eat in Wells at 12:30.”

“Alright,” Eddie nodded. “See you guys.” He veered down a dirt path off of the campus green.  
  
“So uh,” Richie began, “what project?”  
  
Stan rolled his eyes.  
  
Wells Dining Hall was always a shit show around 12:30, but it was the only time they were all free so they made the sacrifice, elbowing freshmen out of their way as they battled towards the sandwich counter, by far the most popular place on campus at lunchtime. Richie spotted an empty table and nearly dove on it, luckily spotting Bev just in time to wave her over and have her help hold seats.  They filled in quickly after that, all used to the routine. Richie snuck to the next table to pull in extra chair over and squeeze it between himself and Ben.

"Who's that for?" Bill asked.

"Eddie," Stan spoke up, "we invited him for lunch. We're doing a project together with Richie."

"Sexy," Bev smiled with a wiggle of her eyebrows.

"You know it," Richie winked at her. "It's weird though, isn't it? He gets here this semester and he already has a class with _three_ of us. It’s some freaky fate shit."

"It's no more serendipitous than you and Ben literally falling into Bill and Eddie when you were kids. Or you guys showing up exactly when I needed you against Bowers," said Mike. "We should all be used to it by now, the universe pushing us together even if Sonia Kaspbrak tries to tear us apart."

"So wise, Mikey," Richie sighed.

Bill spotted Eddie first and waved him towards their table where he squeezed into his reserved seat. The tables were definitely not made for seven.

"Hey Eds, how's it hangin'?"

"It's Eddie, actually," he quipped, "and everything's hanging just fine, thanks for the concern."

Richie waved him off and started in on his sandwich while Stan and Eddie began to work out the details on their project. He wasn't especially concerned with the planning part. If they gave him a task he would complete it, simple. He spent a while just enjoying the bustle of the people around him. It was one of the reasons he was itching to move them all to the city so badly, Richie loved the energy of a big crowd. Unfortunately it would be a tough sell for some of his crew who preferred peace and quiet. _Speaking of_ , he thought.

"Are we all booked up for the camping trip, Big Bill?"

Bill nodded, his mouth too stuffed with potato chips to really answer, though that didn't really stop him from trying. Every year since they were sixteen the Losers had taken a camping trip together into the woods of Maine. Well, further into the woods of Maine than they already were. They had a little cabin by a lake that they rented from a family friend of Bill's. Richie always thought it was very _Friday the 13th_ but so far no one had died.

"Yep," Bill finally spoke. "Talked to Ted about it last week, we're clear for the our usual weekend." Their trip always fell conveniently on Parent's Weekend, mostly for Bev and Bill's sake. Stan and Eddie had wrapped up their conversation and were watching Bill and Richie discuss details about rides.

"We'll just t-take your car and Mike's truck again, that's still seven seats even if we have t-to use one for bags."

"Seven?" Bev asked.

"W-well yeah. Oh shit, I d-didn't actually ask Eddie yet." He turned to Eddie, laughing at himself a little. "Wanna come camping?"

"Uh, when?" While Bill filled him in on the details Richie sat a little stunned. An hour ago he had been feeling grateful that his temptation time was cut down to three fifty minute class periods a week, now suddenly they would be spending late nights making some presentation about globalization _and_ they would be heading back to a cabin in which they had personally christened pretty much every available bed. Beyond that he had just gotten used to the idea of letting himself be happy around Eddie. Just thinking about the trip was sharpening some of the pain that had started to dissipate. The first year there without him had been one of the hardest weekends of Richie's life.

"Yeah, okay," Eddie smiled at Bill. "Sounds fun."

* * *

Later that week Richie had himself holed up in the library to get some bullshit reading response done. The quiet was driving him a little crazy, but he had to admit that trying to get it done in the student center had turned into a lot of people watching and not a lot of writing; So here he was in the slightly suffocating space at the end of an otherwise empty long wooden table. His foot tapped impatiently on the floor earning him a dirty look from a girl across the room. He held still for a minute until his hand picked up the same tempo with a pencil on his notebook. After a few more scribbled sentences he closed his eyes and folded his hands behind his head, propping his feet up on the chair next to him. He might have actually dozed off until his feet suddenly fell back to the ground, jerking him awake.

"Oops." Eddie stood in front of him, feigning innocence.

"You devil, Kaspbrak. That dream was just starting to get good."

"Spare me the details." He pulled out the chair the rest of the way so he could sit next to Richie and pulled out a notebook covered in geometric doodles and a chunky engineering textbook. He flipped to a dog-eared page and started to write, his handwriting hasty and scrawling. Richie tried to turn his attention back to his work, but if he had been distracted before it was nothing compared to now. On impulse he kicked Eddie's ankle. Eddie didn't look up but kicked him right back twice as hard. They kept it up for a few more rounds before Eddie looked up at him, annoyed.

"Can I help you?"

"Oh I bet you can, Eds."

"That doesn't even make sense, Richie." He tried to go back to his work. Richie gave him a moment of peace before interrupting again.

"Watcha workin' on?"

Eddie fixed him with a long stare, apparently deciding the work was probably a lost cause.

"It's my intro to mechanical engineering class. Most of it's the same stuff they covered back at SMCC, so it's pretty easy."

"Doesn't look easy from here."

"Yeah well, I'm sure whatever you do doesn't look easy to me either, whatever it is. I don't think you ever told me your major."

"Communications!" Richie announced with sarcastic bravado.

"You don't sound thrilled about it."

"M'not. It's something to do, though."

"A pretty expensive something to do, isn't it?"

"I guess. It's technically supposed to give me some kind of jump in what I actually want though so I'll keep it up."

"And what do you actually want?"

"Showbiz, baby. Comedian would be top notch but I'm not actually that picky."

Eddie smiled at that.

"Orono, Maine's next big thing?"

"Oh god no, hopefully New York City's, maybe Los Angeles'."

"Huh, I almost applied to school's there. New York, I mean."

 _I know, Eds._ _We talked about it together._

"So why didn't you?"

"Like I said before, my mom showed me it just didn't make a lot of sense." Richie had a lot to say about that, but settled for keeping it civil.

"Maybe your mom just doesn't make a lot of sense."

Eddie scoffed.

"Maybe you're right."  
  
They settled into an almost comfortable silence, both picking up their pencils. Richie knew he was sneaking a few too many glances Eddie's way but couldn't really help it. His nose was all scrunched up in concentration and Richie was dying to kiss it. He shifted his focus to the actual work Eddie was doing and found himself impressed with how comfortable Eddie seemed with the challenge. School had never come as effortlessly to him as it had to Richie, but he worked confidently now, speeding through the problem set.

"How did you end up in engineering?"

"I dunno, I was always good with mechanical things. It's a good hobby, nobody really bothers you while you're working on that kinda stuff."

Richie nodded thoughtfully, remembering all the times he himself had bothered Eddie while he was working on that kind of stuff. He had one particularly vivid memory of going home from Eddie's garage to find dark grease handprints all over his back when he went to shower before bed.

"So you're saying you're good with your hands?"

"Shut up, Richie."


	6. five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the long hiatus, work was taking all of my energy. but i'm really excited to be back writing this fic! <3

“Well there’s two parts to it, we have to do a paper and a presentation.”  
  
Eddie wrinkled his nose at Stan.  
  
“My two least favorite things,” he grumbled.  
  
“It’s alright Eds, you can be my muse, just sit there and look pretty,” Richie drawled.  
  
“No he can’t. But if you and Richie can handle most of the research, Eddie, I’ll write the paper and we can split the presentation,” Stan said. Eddie nodded, getting up from the kitchen table to reach into the cabinet and pour himself a glass of water. Richie smiled to himself. A few weeks ago Eddie was still sitting stiffly between all of them, always mindful of the volume of his voice and if he was ever too close to anyone. Now he hardly knocked before walking into their house and dropping himself on the couch, often leaned up against Bev.  
  
That part was new. Eddie and Bev had always been close in the sense that they were all close, but now Eddie gravitated towards her in a way he never had before. They had grown into a similar sense of humor, a sharp one that Eddie had often tried on as a teenager but had never really fit him until now. It was dangerous that Bev was the one, she was the worst at her poker face. Twice already she had tried to joke with him about an old memory. She had laughed it off, but it left Eddie looking thoughtful each time.  
  
Eddie’s attachment to Bill was not so new. He still hung on nearly every word and laughed a little too hard at all of his jokes. Richie rolled his eyes every time and hoped that he wouldn't have to watch Eddie's hopeless crush crash and burn a second time in his life. Still, it was obvious that both Bill and Eddie were happy to have found each other. There was a natural comfort between them, they smiled easily around each other. Bill had picked up his old habit of ruffling Eddie's hair. When Richie tried to do the same he had earned himself a sharp pinch on his wrist. It was a work in progress.

Richie swung his feet up into Eddie's empty chair.

"What city did we get stuck with?" he asked.

"Cairo," Stan replied. "We need to compare ancient Cairo to modern day, and also compare it to three other major cities. It's all in the syllabus."

"You got all that?" Richie asked Eddie, who ignored him and shoved Richie’s feet out of the way so he could sit back down.

"But it's not due for a while, right?"

"Not until before Thanksgiving break, but I'd like to have it done by November I think. It's not actually that much to do, if we stay f-," Stan cut himself off, staring at Eddie and Richie who were caught in a back and forth as Richie tried to wiggle his toes back onto the seat under Eddie's butt. "If we stay focused," he sighed to himself.  
  
\--

Richie had become used to six being the new normal. Bill, Stan, Bev, Mike, Ben, and Richie. But now that Eddie was back in the mix it was hard to imagine that he had ever left. He had learned to handle six, but seven was right. 

It wasn’t exactly the same, though, because Eddie wasn’t exactly the same. His two years away had made him more confident, he carried his head a little higher. He was still prone to outbursts, but had learned to better pick his battles. He still picked most of the ones against Richie. 

He even had a brand new wardrobe, apparently tailored to make Richie’s life hell. It wasn’t the clothes themselves, they were mostly the typical college jeans and a t-shirt. The problem was the way they fit. The shirts were exactly the right size, which meant a lot of shifting up whenever Eddie stretched or reached for pretty much anything. Even worse were the jeans that curved perfectly around him when he twisted or bent down, which he was doing quite a lot, if you asked Richie.  
  
The agony was worth it, though, to see Eddie slide between Ben and Mike so casually every day at lunch. Today was no different. They were a month into the semester, October winds were beginning to threaten the lingering September heat. Their “table” was really three smaller tables shoved together, entirely too small for their big group. Richie’s lanky legs stuck out almost all the way to the other side, his knees bumping Eddie’s first by accident and then a few more times on purpose.  
  
“Cut it out, asshole.”  
  
“Make me,” Richie winked.  
  
He had been only okay at keeping his promise to Bev. He justified it by telling her that although it wasn’t exactly his best behavior, it also certainly wasn’t his worst. She definitely didn’t buy it. She had taken to physically harming him every time he slipped up, sometimes a pinch to his back, sometimes an elbow dug into his thigh, occasionally a flick to his elbow. Today she went for the elbow, because if was the easiest to hide under the table. 

Old habits certainly died hard, though, especially when nearly everything Eddie said or did reminded Richie of some moment from years ago. Today it was the way Eddie absently twirled his pasta around his fork. While the others chattered about their plans for tonight Richie’s mind wandered back to the first “date” he had tried to pull off after their kiss in the Denbrough backyard.   
  
Typically Maggie stayed home when Went travelled to conferences, but this one had been in San Diego and she wasn’t going to pass up a chance to visit the beach. She asked Richie to come, but just last week he had started kissing the cutest boy in the world and he wasn’t about to put 3,000 miles between them, even for a couple of days. The official story was that he was staying with Bill, apparently “almost seventeen” wasn’t old enough for him to stay home. He did his diligence, making small talk with Bill’s parents and then spending a couple of hours lounging around his bedroom before slipping out the window and hurrying back to his own place. A quick phone call, a little sweet talking to Sonia, and Eddie was knocking on his door ten minutes later. 

He couldn’t wipe the grin off his face as he opened the door and pulled Eddie through it, making him stumble over the door frame and curse, clutching Richie’s arm so he didn’t go down face first.  
  
“Thanks, asshole,” he grumbled, straightening up and turning his face up towards Richie’s. His taut frown softened, apparently powerless against Richie’s shining eyes.  
  
“Anytime, my love.” Richie wasted no more time catching Eddie’s lips in a kiss, because kissing Eddie was already his new favorite thing. He untangled his hand from Eddie’s shirt and brought it up to cradle Eddie’s face, his fingertips just barely brushing into the sides of Eddie’s hair. Eddie sighed into the kiss, parting his lips enough for Richie’s tongue to brush against the tip of his top lip and _that_ was new, he shivered closer so he was pressed against Richie’s chest. The places where they touched burned hot on Richie’s skin, he was dizzy as his tongue brushed Eddie’s over and over until he was totally overwhelmed. When he pulled back, breathing heavy, he saw his own want reflected in Eddie’s eyes.  
But, dinner first. He grabbed Eddie’s hand and pulled him further into the house, towards the kitchen.  
  
“Listen, I swear this was a coincidence, there was like, no other food here,” he began, bracing himself for Eddie’s reaction. On the counter was a large bowl of spaghetti, drowned in tomato sauce. Eddie fixed him with a glare, but there was no bite to it.  
  
“Fine, it just means the nickname is off limits all night.”  
  
“No promises, Sp-,” Eddie smacked his arm.

Richie shuffled around the kitchen, grabbing plates and forks, almost forgetting the napkins. He pulled a chair out and waved his arm towards it, gesturing at Eddie.  
  
“What are you doing, Rich?” Eddie laughed.  
  
“I dunno,” Richie shot back, flustered. “Date stuff?”  
  
“So this is a date, huh?”  
  
Eddie’s smirk made Richie nervous, but only until Eddie crossed the room to wrap his arms around Richie’s neck and bury his face in his shoulder. Richie nudged his nose into Eddie’s hair, smiling against him, and squeezed around his waist.  
  
A loud rumbling from Richie’s stomach ended the moment and made Eddie chuckle. They played at domesticity as they ate, recounting the highlights of their days and nudging their knees together. When they finished Eddie took the dishes to the sink and tossed the drying rag at Richie. Richie watched him rinse the sauce off, checking and double-checking for any leftover spots. _Someday_ , he thinks, although he isn’t really sure yet what that means.  
  
The loud scraping of chairs against the tile floor of the dining hall jerked him back to reality, Bev tugging on his arm to get him to move.  
  
“Convening at the clubhouse by nine?” Ben asked. Bill nodded a confirmation, and they began to part ways.  
  
“Richie, wait,” Eddie was taking long strides to catch up to him. “Can we start the research tonight? I don’t wanna see Stan’s bad side if we don’t get it done.”  
  
“Good call, Spaghetti.”  
  
Eddie jolted.

"What did you call me?" No anger, just surprise.

Richie froze, stumbling over his words as he backtracked.

"Spaghetti, like Eddie, and you were just ea-, y'know, ‘cause it rhymes." Eddie shook his head, his eyebrows dipping in frustration. He wouldn't lift his eyes off the ground.

"Whatever, second floor of the library at seven?"

"Yeah," Richie faltered, "okay." He was sure Eddie didn't hear him, he was already marching away.  
  
\--  
  
Another two classes stood between Richie and the study session. _Session, not date,_ he reminded himself again. He tried to follow the drone of his international media professor, but found himself daydreaming about freckled skin while his pen absently drew dots on his paper and connected them with lines, creating constellations. 

By the time he was in his next class his mood had soured some. He was kicking himself for being careless with the nickname. Complications aside, Eddie was clearly still annoyed with it all these years later, the way he stomped off. Richie could be more careful, had at least enough patience to get through a little bit more of this as long as it kept Eddie around. It had only been a few weeks, as Mike had reassured him a hundred times, ‘give it time.’

Richie rushed into the library at 7:09, booking it up the wide marble staircase to look for Eddie at one of the wide, wooden tables. He peered around the musty bookshelves, but didn't find him. Suddenly his eye caught on the flash of a white sneaker over by the far wall where there were only desks. Desks intended to be used by one person, with high wooden walls making the space private and cozy. Eddie had pulled a second chair up to one of these desks and was leaned into it, his backpack behind the chair making him unmistakable. Richie swallowed heavily, and made his way over.

"Hey, Eddie," he kept his tone even, almost professional.

"Thought you might not show, slowpoke," Eddie smiled up at him. It made Richie's heart stutter.

He had noticed that Eddie smiled more often now in general. In Derry these toothy, wide smiles had been saved for the Losers Club, acquaintances got a tight-lipped, tense imitation. But now Richie was an acquaintance, barely more than a stranger, and Eddie gifted his warm grin easily. Richie fell into his chair, pulled into Eddie's orbit. The walls of the desk blocked out the rest of the library, nowhere to look but at each other. Richie had been worried that Eddie would still be upset about earlier, but his demeanor was friendly. There were already a few books in front of him, but he hadn’t opened them.

“And turn down the chance to snuggle up with you? Never.” He braced himself for a smack, probably with a book, but Eddie just turned away to hide a slight blush.  _ Oh. Okay. _

"Get anything good yet?" Richie stammered, waving a hand towards the books.

"Haven't really looked," he shrugged. "I was kind of procrastinating."

"Gotcha. Well, you were right about Stan the Man, better not to poke the dragon." Richie reached for the nearest book and cracked it open, running a finger down the table of contents. Beside him Eddie just fiddled with his pencil. Richie smiled to himself, this was more like his Eddie, finding any excuse to push off schoolwork.

"Do you wanna take ancient or modern?"

"Ancient, I guess. That's at least more interesting."

Richie nodded his agreement and pushed the book he had been looking through in front of Eddie instead.

"Page 137, it looks like this book is mostly charts and graphs, might be easier to get through."

"Thanks," Eddie sighed. He cracked his notebook open and took down the name of the book. Richie jumped up to browse the shelves for more material, hastily pulling a few books off the shelf and bounding back to his seat. Eddie had a few notes down but he was frowning.

"Hey, Eds."

"Hm?"

"Bet I can get more notes than you in ten minutes." Eddie grinned.

"You're on." 

They worked in near silence after that, both of them furiously scribbling anything that might be relevant. When the time had passed Richie shouted.

"Time!" Comparing notes, Eddie's list was just a little bit longer. Richie would never point out that his handwriting was also just a little bit bigger than Richie's own. The victory energized Eddie enough to work for another twenty minutes before his pen started looping meaningless doodles on the opposite page.

"Should we trade and compare?" Richie suggested. "If we're supposed to be contrasting them then we need the have the same kind of facts."

"And then break time?"

"Sure, break time." Richie slid Eddie's notebook over to himself and drew underlines beneath the facts that seemed most relevant. This time Eddie called the time, slamming Richie's book shut.

"Does this time work for you every week?" He asked.

"Yeah," Richie replied, stretching his arms over his head and letting one hand fall into his hair. "Every day except Thursdays are good for me, usually."

"Why Thursdays?"

"I try to do stand up over at the Bear Brew every week. The crowd is pretty weak, but practice makes perfect. And we have kind of a crew that does it so we can give each other feedback and all that." Richie answered, rubbing at the back of his neck.

"I'll have to come see you sometime," Eddie said, looking thoughtfully down at his work. "It's nice that you have that kind of group."

"Yeah, they're good people." Richie watched Eddie curiously, there was something on the tip of his tongue that he just wasn't spitting out. "What's on your mind?"

"Just thinking," he murmured. He sat up to face Richie. "I told myself that when I came here I would put myself out there, try and be a part of something."

"Got any ideas?"

"One," Eddie began, hesitating. "I was thinking maybe Wilde Stein, y'know, the LGBT group." His eyes flicked towards the stairway, the nearest exit. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, reopening them with determination.

“Because I’m gay.”

His confident expression was betrayed by the way his eyes nervously searched Richie’s face. Richie himself almost laughed out loud, his mind running through all the ways Eddie had already proven that to him, either underneath or on top of him. But Eddie was looking more nervous every second and Richie had to wipe that worry away.

“It’s all good, Eds.”

Eddie’s shoulders dropped with a long exhale.

“I actually talked to Bev already, she said you’d all be fine with it, but…”

“It’s still not easy, sure,” Richie finished. "I don't know if Bev told you but I actually bat for both teams anyways," he felt his own nerves setting in, not everyone was kind about that, even inside the community.

"She didn't tell me, but I had a hunch," Eddie admitted.

"Really?" Richie laughed. "What was it? My impeccable style? My flair for the dramatic?"

"None of the above, moron," Eddie deadpanned.

"Well anyways, you should go for it."

"Yeah," Eddie nodded. "I think I will. That was the deal," his eyes suddenly turned up and burned into Richie's. "That I would go after what I want."

It was Richie's turn to flush, a stone dropping into his stomach. He turned away, back to his notes.

"Twenty more minutes and we'll head back to the house, yeah?" 

Eddie hummed an agreement and traded his notes back.  They both leaned in to their work, the walls of the desk hugging them close together. The sharp, masculine scent of Eddie's shampoo swirled around Richie, pulling him to lean a little closer, his right elbow bumping into Eddie's right. Eddie nudged him back, gently, and left his arm resting against Richie's. Thank god Bev couldn't see them now.

\--

Back at the house the rest of the Losers were already sprawled across the dark living room watching an old slasher flick. Bev sat perched on Ben's lap, mostly so he could sneak his face into her shoulder at the especially gory parts.

"Hey g-guys," Bill greeted them.

"Hi, Bill," Eddie chirped, Richie just waved.

"Beers in the fridge?" He asked, and Bill nodded back. "Want one, Eddie?"

"Yeah, thanks Richie." He plopped himself beside Ben on the couch, Bev's legs stretching over his lap. Richie took a long break in the kitchen, trying to smack some sense back into himself. He stuck his torso into the fridge, relishing the cold, before reaching in to grab a couple of cans.  _ Slow and steady _ , he thought.  _ Someday _ .

He groaned to himself when he went back to the living room and realized the only open seat was next to Eddie.  _ Of course.  _ He handed a beer over to Eddie and cracked his own, focused on maintaining the several inches between his own thigh and Eddie's. He trained his attention on the screen and soon got lost in the kitschy fun of it, gasping and laughing along with his friends. He couldn't resist the temptation to add in his own corny commentary, shouting advice at the screen.

"Sh-shut the f-fuck up, Richie." Bill tossed some popcorn at him from his seat in one of the armchairs. It bounced off of his cheek onto the floor and he snatched up, popping it into his mouth anyways. 

"Gross," Mike announced, getting up from his seat leaning against the chair that Stan was huddled into. "Beer run, who needs one?" Six hands shot up and he chuckled, returning quickly with his arms loaded up. Richie accepted his gratefully, snapping it open and taking a long gulp. When he tuned back into the move a blushing blonde was running through the a house screaming. She flung herself into a bathroom and pulled the curtain shut. Richie capitalized on the tension of the moment, leaning over to Eddie to whisper.

"That's us next weekend, Eds. Cabin in the woods, horny young adults, totally alone."

"Just shut up, Richie," he hissed back, wide eyes watching intently. When the killer burst through the door he jumped, pressing against Richie and staying there, glued to his side. Richie cackled, wrapping his arm automatically around Eddie’s shoulders. Bev shot him a look, but he ignored her. It would be too weird to take it back now, right? He let Eddie lean into him the rest of the movie, quietly savoring the jump scares. When, at one point, Eddie hid his face in his shoulder Richie had to ignore the instinct to sneak a kiss into the side of his hair.

As the credits rolled he gingerly pulled his arm back before Mike flicked the lights back on. Eddie frowned at him, but stayed quiet, soon being pulled into a conversation with Bev who still sat happily on Ben who smiled fondly up at her. A pang of jealousy clenched Richie's insides.  _ Yeah, take it slow, Richie,  _ he thought bitterly, _ keep waiting, maybe forever. _ It wasn't fair, everyone was trying, he knew that. But it barely made it easier. Especially when Eddie hadn't actually moved any further away, his side bumping against Richie's when he emphatically talked with his hands, another lingering habit. 

Richie's mind wandered back to the memory from earlier that afternoon, after they had finished drying the dishes and had landed on the Tozier's couch, Eddie settled onto Richie's lap, his thighs hugging Richie's hips. They had continued their eager exploration, their hands roaming up and underneath the other's shirt. Coming up for air Richie had let his head fall back on the back of the couch, grinning.

"God, Eds, how'd I land you?" Eddie laughed as Richie started to pepper his neck with kisses. "You're practically perfect."

"Practically?" Eddie asked, faking indignant.

"Well, you're a little snappy." 

Eddie glared, crossing his arms.

"But it's all good, for better or for worse and all that," Richie drawled lazily.

"We're not married, Richie."

"Not yet."

Eddie flushed, leaning forward to hide his face in Richie's neck.

"Technically you're not even my boyfriend," he mumbled.

"I'm not?" Richie asked, honestly surprised.

"Well we never actually..." Richie pushed on Eddie's shoulders so he sat up straight, catching his eyes.

"Eddie Kaspbrak, be my boyfriend?"

The sweet, slow kiss Eddie offered was enough of an answer.

And now, sitting beside him on a ratty old couch, the bump of his hip against Richie's would have to be enough. For now.

  
  



	7. six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> camping pt 1!

This had to be fake. He must have woken up in a sitcom, or at least a hidden camera show staged by his idiot friends. There was no other possible explanation for how totally cliche it was that Eddie had weaseled his way into the middle seat in the back of Bill’s car, snug between Richie and Bev, and promptly fallen asleep with his head resting lightly on Richie’s shoulder. The ride wasn’t even long, maybe an hour, but now, forty-five minutes in, Richie had suffered through twenty minutes of trying to sit ramrod straight while Eddie leaned heavily into his side. Bev wasn’t helping, giggling at him behind her hand.  
  
He sighed and turned to look out the window, watching the quick flashes of orange and yellow on the trees bordering the highway. When Bill pulled off onto a thin, winding road the colors dissolved into a monotone green as they drove into a thicker forest populated by pine trees. The uneven road knocked Eddie around, forcing him awake. He blinked his eyes open and flicked them up to find what was supporting him.  
  
“Shit, sorry!” He squeaked, jerking his body back upright.  
  
“Glad to be of service, Spaghetti,” Richie replied, bumping his shoulder into Eddie’s.  
  
“Are we there?”  
  
“Just about,” Bill answered from the front seat. Two more right turns, one left, and the cabin came into view. Just beyond it the sun sparkled on a wide lake spread out between the trees.  
  
“Wow,” Eddie whispered. “Doesn’t matter how long you live here, some things never get old.” They swung open the doors, stretching on their way out of the car. Mike’s truck pulled up behind them and he and Stan hopped out. Bill, Ben, and Bev turned to check in with them, make the typical small talk about the drive, but Richie’s eyes were glued to Eddie, who had begun to walk slowly towards the lake, his brows drawn tightly down as he took in the space. He stopped just short of stepping into the water and stared out, chewing on his lower lip. Richie watched him for a long moment before following, coming to stand slightly behind him.  
  
“You okay, Eds?” He tried to keep his voice quiet, but Eddie jumped anyways.  
  
“Shit, Richie,” he gasped, “yeah, sorry.” He turned away from the water. “Can we go inside?”  
  
“Sure thing, Bill’s got the keys.”  
  
Balancing his armful of pillows and sleeping bags on his knee, Bill slid the key into the rusted lock and pushed the door open. It swung in with a loud creak, revealing the open room that served as a living room to the left, a kitchen to the right. As they trooped through the door Richie caught the familiar woody scent, closing his eyes and inhaling deeply. Last time Eddie had come through this door with them it had been on Richie’s back, his ankles locked around his waist.

The walls were finished only with a light wood varnish, leaving the bright pine boards exposed. Straight ahead of them was a skinny wooden ladder that led up to a modest loft with three twin beds arranged along the walls. On either side of the ladder were two doors, each leading into a bedroom. Eddie moved towards the door on the right, almost reaching his hand out for the knob before dropping it and turning back around, shaking his head lightly. They hadn’t actually discussed sleeping arrangements, Richie realized. Ben and Bev went automatically into the room on the left, their permanent space with a queen size bed to share. Mike went back out to the truck to bring in more bags while Bill started climbing the ladder, tossing his sleeping bag up to the top and reaching down to take Stan’s from him. Richie cleared his throat loudly and dropped his stuff onto the musty green couch beside him. He locked eyes with Bill, looked to Eddie, and then back to Bill who got suddenly sheepish and gave a small nod.  
  
“Ed-Eddie, you can come up h-here if you want, there’s three b-”

“That’s okay,” Eddie interrupted. “Ben gave me the details, he and Bev share that room,” he pointed, “you, Mike, and Stan share the loft. He said Richie’s room has an extra bed anyways.”  
  
“He did, huh?” Richie asked through gritted teeth. “What a guy, that Hanscom.”  
  
“I’m sure Stan would s-switch,” Bill tried again, kicking Stan’s arm from where he still hung off the ladder.  
  
“Ow, asshole, yeah, I’ll switch.” Stan grumbled.  
  
“Actually I, uh, don’t like heights,” Eddie spat out, “so I’ll just stay with Richie. Is it this room?” He cocked his head towards the door on the right, grasping the doorknob.  
  
“Yeah, that’s the one, Eddie,” Ben popped out of his room, a sunshiny smile on his face.  
  
“Great, thanks Ben,” Eddie opened the door and disappeared into the room. Slowly, Ben noticed that all three other men in the room were glaring at him.  
  
“What?”  
  
Joining Bill and Stan in a chorus of exasperated sighs, Richie picked up his things and trudged after Eddie.

\--

“You’re going to burn them, Richie!”  
  
“Chill out, they’re fine!”  
  
Stan wrested the spatula out of Richie’s hand, a feat when Richie had nearly six inches on him, and flipped the burgers on the grill, frowning at the deep black grill marks already seared into the side.

“See? Perfectly well done,” Richie said, apparently not noticing the twitch in Stan’s jaw.  
  
“Get out of here, Richie,” Mike butted in, walking up behind them. “Go find someone else to bother.”

“Aye aye, captain.” He bounded off the small porch, nearly tripping over his own long legs. Bev was swinging gently in the hammock by the water and he honed in on his target, jogging over and tossing himself on top of her, sending the hammock swinging and Bev shrieking.  
  
“What the fuck, Richie?” He ignored her, sticking a leg out to steady them with his foot and nuzzling his face in her neck. Her arms came to wrap around his back, she played lazily with his hair while she spoke.

“What’s up, babe?”  
  
“Just missed you,” he answered. He slid his eyes shut and hummed when she scratched gently at his scalp.  
  
“Let’s move here,” she said, closing her own eyes behind her wide sunglasses.  
  
“Done deal, but I call the queen size, you and Ben can shove into the two twins.”  
  
“What, so you can snuggle up with Eddie on my bed? No such luck, asshole.” She jabbed at his side, jerking them both sideways.  
  
“Watch it, you witch! And wherever Eddie chooses to sleep in this scenario is entirely up to him. There’s a lovely couch pull-out...or he could join me and I could show him how I pull o-”  
  
“That’s it!” Bev yelled, and braced her hands against his shoulders to shove him off onto the ground. He hit with a sharp grunt and glared up at her.  
  
“You could have killed me, Marsh, and for a joke that you totally set me up for.” She ignored him while he readjusted to sit against the tree by her feet.  
  
“He was pretty eager to share your room, Rich,” she grinned.  
  
“Yeah, thanks to the ever-accommodating Ben Hanscom I get to be stuck in close quarters for three days. Well, nights. Which is worse.”

“Whatever, it’s hot that he wants to sleep with you.”  
  
“Separate beds,” Richie groaned. “You’re not helping, I’m supposed to be hands off.”

“But you’re so fun to fuck with. And anyways, it’s not _your_ hands I’m worried about,” she finished seriously.  
  
“Maybe it should be,” he mumbled. Eddie walked out of the cabin beside Bill, changed into a thin tank top and a pair of board shorts. “Didn’t anyone tell him it’s only sixty degrees?”  
  
“I think they’re taking the kayaks out, they’ll work up a sweat. You should join them.” Richie ignored her, pushing himself to his feet and heading back into the house, brushing past Eddie without a word. He closed the door to their room and fell back on the bed, clapping his hand over his eyes. His sleeping bag rustled under him as he shifted uncomfortably. He let his arm fall beside him, almost surprised when it hung off the edge instead of falling on the mattress of Eddie’s bed.

Their first year here Richie had pouted when it was decided that Bev and Ben would get the big bed, disappointed that he wouldn’t get to share with Eddie, but Eddie had just shoved the smaller beds together and yanked Richie down onto them, kicking the door shut behind them. The next year Richie had no complaints, moving the bed himself as soon as they arrived. That year they had also decided to zip their sleeping bags together to create one giant bag, giggling like idiots when they crawled inside it. With two bodies inside it warmed up quick, easily remedied by the rushed removal of their clothes through heated kisses. What happened next was a memory Richie visited often, even before Eddie had re-appeared, and it played out again for him now, all the way through the end.  
  
_“_ Fuck _, I love you,” Richie panted, pulling himself out of Eddie and flopping onto his back. He wiggled his arm under Eddie’s neck so it was around his shoulders and buried his face in his hair. “And I love fucking you.”  
__  
_ _“Yeah, and I think everyone here knows it now,” Eddie snorted, closing his eyes and stretching his hands above his head.  
__  
_ _“Eh, it’s no secret.” Eddie rolled his eyes, but wore a wide grin as he crawled back on top of Richie, leaning in to kiss him._

Groaning, Richie pushed the phantom feeling away and rolled onto his stomach, moping around in bed for another hour. When he finally peeled himself off the skinny mattress he found Mike and Stan sitting in the living room and walked past them to push through the front door. Bill, Bev, Ben, and Eddie sat around an empty fire pit in camping chairs they had pulled out from under the porch. He leaned on the railing of the porch and just watched them, listened to Bev tease Bill, smiled at Eddie’s responding laugh that made him toss his head back so he spotted Richie.  
  
“Richie!” He called, twisting in his chair. “Come sit!” Always unable to deny Eddie anything, he obliged. He fell heavily into the chair on Ben’s right, Eddie’s left.  
  
“I was just telling Eddie,” Beverly laughed over her words, “about Bill’s angsty phase.”  
  
“Phase?” Richie replied, “a couple drinks and Denbrough will still tell you all about his inner demons.”  
  
“That a promise?” Eddie chuckled, elbowing Bill on his other side. Bill grumbled, stood, and crossed the circle to yank Richie up by the collar of his button down.

“The fuck?”  
  
“Cooler,” Bill nodded his head towards his car and marched off, not bothering to check if Richie was following behind him. He was. They hauled the heavy cooler, full of ice and beer, back towards the fire. Richie fell back into his seat and accepted the cold bottle offered to him, tipping it towards Bill in thanks. The sun was setting now, glaring off of the water ahead of Richie. He turned his head to shade his eyes from the harsh light and immediately caught Eddie’s eyes, who had clearly been watching him already. He offered Richie a small smile and, to Richie’s surprise, held his gaze. Every second they sat like that Richie felt closer to exploding, tension blooming in his chest. He broke first, turning his eyes to the fire pit.  
  
“S’getting dark,” he muttered. “Did we bring wood?”  
  
“There’s a pile in the shed,” Bill answered. “I’ll go. But we need kindling, go find some.” Taking the offered escape, Richie stood and nodded. He started towards the edge of the surrounding woods when he heard Eddie speak up.  
  
“Need help?”  
  
“Uh, I mean, it’s just like twigs and stuff…” But Eddie had already left his chair, his shoulder brushing Richie’s as he strode past. He hadn’t yet changed out of the shorts that he had worn kayaking. Sighing, Richie followed him into the forest. They searched the ground for dried leaves. He was pretty sure Eddie wasn’t actually bending over like _that_ on purpose but it was harder to deny that when their hands brushed there was no actual excuse for Eddie to have been that close. With only a meager handful he announced that they had plenty and marched back towards the pit.

Mike and Stan burst out of the cabin then, cradling packages of marshmallows, graham crackers, and chocolate. They dropped them beside the cooler and pulled up more camping chairs between Bev and Richie, completing the circle. The temperature was dropping with the sun, Richie shrugged deeper into the light denim jacket he wore. As Bev tore open the bag of marshmallows and Bill built a fire the club fell into easy conversation.  
  
“You headed back to Derry for Thanksgiving this year, Bill? I’m trying to bum a ride,” Ben asked.  
  
“Guess s-so, but p-probably only for Thursday.” They hashed out the details between them, figuring out the timing, where they would meet, if Bev would be coming. Richie watched Eddie watching them, his eyes darting between Bill and Ben, his nose starting to scrunch up.  
  
“Did you guys ever go to that one ice cream place with the striped roof?” he suddenly asked, his eyes squinting like he was searching for something. “That’s one thing I almost remember from Derry.” There was no use in Richie letting his mind wander in frustration to all the times they had _all_ been there, so he focused in on the fire in front of him and let Bill do the talking.  
  
“Y-yeah. All the time.” He chose his next words carefully, speaking slow, “Who took you there, Eddie?”  
  
Eddie only shrugged.  
  
“Must’ve been my mom, I guess. I just remember the roof.” The disappointed fall of Bill’s shoulders mirrored the drop of Richie’s heart. It wasn’t the first of these conversations, opportunities to pick Eddie’s brain had come up often in the last few weeks, always with the same empty conclusion. Still squinting, Eddie stood and announced he was off to use the bathroom. By now the sun had disappeared, leaving them with only the flickering firelight. Their silence was deafening.  
  
“Guys,” Mike ventured cautiously, “should we talk about this?” Everyone else raised their eyes, Richie’s stayed trained on the edge of the pit. “I mean, we aren’t really getting anywhere, what if…” he looked to Richie before he continued, “what if it has to be a fresh start?”  
  
Richie felt Bev’s hand on his arm as he rose from his chair, but he brushed her off. His feet took him automatically towards the dark forest, straight to place he knew there was the beginning of a small path. Trusting his muscle memory, he stumbled through it, letting white noise buzz in his head until he reached the end, a tall, jagged cliff overlooking a deep lake. He let his body collapse underneath him, gravity weighing heavily on his shoulders. He swung his legs over the edge and kicked them out hard so his heels hit the rock face hard on the backswing.

Mike’s words itched uncomfortably in his skin. For Richie, there was no such thing as a fresh start with Eddie, unless it was only as his friend. Trying to restart anything romantic with this imbalance would feel wrong, dishonest. He couldn’t look into Eddie’s eyes knowing everything he didn’t remember, everything Richie remembered so vividly. Besides, he wasn’t so sure that this wasn’t working; Just a week ago Eddie had made a joke about Bill’s rusty old bike he tried to keep running way too long, Bill had been certain he hadn’t told Eddie anything about that bike since they met again.  
  
Suddenly Richie was vaguely aware of crunching leaves behind him, the sound getting louder with every nearing footstep. He didn’t bother turning, none of the Losers were very good at letting each other wallow without trying to butt in, he had been expecting one of them and he didn’t especially care who it was. Until it was Eddie. His shoulder bumped Richie’s as he sat down beside him, hesitating for just a second before letting his legs hang out over the cliff.  
  
“How’d you know where the path was?”  
  
“Stan showed me.”  
  
_Right. Of course._  
  
They sat in silence for longer than Richie thought he was actually capable of, until Eddie broke it with a quiet voice.  
  
“Do you think you would ever jump from this high up?” Richie eyed the distance, comparing. He could do it, they’d done worse before.  
  
“Yeah, I think I would.”  
  
“I’m not sure if I could do it.”  
  
“Bet you could, Eds.”  
  
_Know you could, actually.  
__  
_ “Either way, my mom would kill me if the fall didn’t.”  
  
“She wouldn’t have to know.”  
  
“Yeah, seems like she somehow always does anyways though.”  
__  
“Sounds like she keeps you on a pretty tight leash.”  
  
More silence, filled only by Eddie starting to kick one of his feet repetitively against the stone face beneath them. His tempo sped up, listening closely Richie heard his breathing start to go up with it. He eyed Eddie’s hand gripping the rock, thought about it, then thought against it.  
  
“She’s crazy,” Eddie blurted. “Well, maybe not really crazy but...lonely. Lonely enough to make her crazy.”  
  
Curious, Richie watched him, waiting for more. It didn’t come, and he didn’t pry. He kept watching while Eddie closed his eyes, stilled his nervous leg, and calmed his breathing. While he watched he noticed that Eddie was shivering, still in only a t-shirt.  
  
“Sorry,” Eddie sighed. His voice was so small, smaller than it had been all semester, a glimpse of the Eddie under Sonia’s thumb returning for the first time. Moving without thinking, Richie yanked on the sleeve of his threadbare denim jacket, twisting it off of himself and draping it over Eddie’s slightly shaking shoulders. Without a word, Eddie slid his arms into it, letting it hang loosely over himself. Absently grabbing for the cuff of the sleeve, he worried it between his fingers. He stared hard at the spot, while Richie stared hard at him, getting swallowed by deja vu.  
  
Four years ago they sat in this exact spot, Eddie wrapped in this exact jacket, but also wrapped in Richie, leaning into his arms, his face buried in his chest. Richie’s heart had been beating a million miles a minute in determination, he was finally going to do it.  
  
“Eds?”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
“I love you.” Eddie’s eyes had opened wide, snapping up to meet Richie’s before he tackled him flat on his back with a kiss.  
  
“Richie?”  
  
Snapping back to reality, Richie glanced up to find Eddie’s wide-eyed gaze. He leaned back on his elbows, willing Eddie to follow him. He didn’t. Richie popped to his feet.  
  
“They’re gonna think we died, let’s go.”


	8. seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> there is NO plot here tbh, just a few scenes of their last day at the lake. any actual story to be resumed in the next chap. <3

“Do you need something?”  
  
Richie just about jumped out of his skin when Eddie grumbled, he had been so sure he was still asleep. His eyes were still shut against the morning sun invading the small room, but apparently were squinted open enough to catch Richie staring shamelessly.  
  
“Nah, you just got some snot.” Eddie brought his hand up to smack aimlessly at his face, rubbing at the spot under his nose and keeping his eyes mostly shut. Chuckling, Richie flipped over to face the wall and remove the temptation to keep watching Eddie do nothing at all. He listened to Eddie shift restlessly behind him, turning over to one side, then the other, then flat onto his stomach. It was his usual I’m-grumpy-because-you-woke-me-up move, but with the beds separated by about five feet of flooring Richie couldn’t turn over and tackle him, his typical retaliation.  
  
Instead, he sat up and swung his feet to the floor, stretching his arms high over his head and groaning way too loud. Eddie scowled and hid under his blanket.  
  
“Rise and shine, spaghetti!”  
  
“Shut up, don’t call me that.”  
  
“No can do, sunshine. It’s time to greet the day!” Eddie just burrowed further into his blankets, mumbling out a curse. Considering the consequences for only a second, Richie leapt onto his bed, throwing himself over the small lump that was Eddie.  
  
“What the fuck?!” Eddie yelled, scrambling to free himself, almost succeeding until Richie wrapped his limbs around him like a koala.  
  
“What, I thought you wanted to stay in bed?” he teased, nuzzling his face into where he thought the top of Eddie’s head was. It was a dangerous move, Eddie whipped his head and nearly broke Richie’s nose on the way. His grip loosened in his surprise, and Eddie managed to poke his head out. He was trying his best to scowl around a smile that was fighting its way onto his face. It brought a matching, unabashed grin to Richie’s.  
  
“Morning.”  
  
“Get off.”  
  
“If you insist…” That was it, with a big push Eddie finally dumped Richie onto the floor.  
  
“Fuck, why does that keep happening this weekend?” Richie moaned, rubbing the back of his head. Eddie ignored him, sitting up and running a hand through his messy hair. Richie fell right back into staring, a sucker for morning Eddie with his bedhead and sleepy, lidded eyes. This time when Eddie caught him, he didn’t say anything, just stared back. Their eyes met for a long, silent moment and Richie leaned into the hopeless feeling that there was some slight recognition in Eddie’s gaze. Suddenly, a loud knock on the cabin door made them both jump. Bev pushed the door open, her mouth already open to speak. She snapped it shut when she took in the sight of Richie disheveled on the floor, Eddie lording above him on the bed.  
  
“Yes, dear?” Richie drawled.  
  
“Pancakes,” she answered, and left with a smirk dancing in her eyes. They trudged after her. In the tiny kitchen Bill hunched over the gas stove, trying and failing to flip a pancake.  
  
“F-fuck,” he cursed, digging the spatula back under what could have once been considered a round object.  
  
“Move,” Stan stole the spatula from him and bumped his shoulder out of the way. Shrugging, Bill turned around, a fleck of batter on his cheek. He was wearing an old dirty “Kiss the Cook” apron.  
  
“Well since you’re asking so nicely, Billy,” Richie began, advancing. Bill looked confused until Eddie pointed squarely at his chest. He barely dodged Richie, ducking and knocking right into Ben who was, thankfully, sturdy enough to absorb the blow and avoid knocking over into Beverly, preventing a domino collapse.  
  
“Fuckin Richie,” Bill whined, rubbing his elbow like he was the one worse off after jabbing it into Ben’s side. Stan ended the nonsense by dropping a pile of plates on the counter and piling the pancakes on top. The Losers Club was only quiet when everyone was stuffing their faces.

\--  
  
The lake was little more than a set piece in mid-October, the air just a little too cold to swim. Still, Eddie stood at the edge barefoot, letting the small waves lap over his toes. He stared hard at the tiny island out in the middle. He jumped when Bill’s hand clapped down on his shoulder.  
  
“Ready?” Eddie turned to look at Bill and nodded.  
  
“Yeah,” he took the paddle that Bill handed to him and followed him towards where two old kayaks were beached on the damp sand. Eddie ducked to inspect the inside of the smaller, light gray boat, satisfied when he found no new spiderwebs. He yanked on the handle, starting the heavy drag towards the water. It was automatic for him to balance carefully with just the tip of the kayak in the water and settling himself into the seat. He recognized the muscle memory of  sticking the paddle out behind him and pushing off of the beach, though if he bothered to think about it he would realize he didn’t actually remember ever using a kayak before this weekend.

Bill followed him in a light blue kayak with noticeably more scratches all over the sides. The wind was kindly absent this morning, making the trip out the island calm and easy. They stayed side by side, silent except for when Bill spotted a family of loons and waved his paddle to point them out, dripping cold water all over himself.  
  
“F-fuck, that’s cold!”  
  
“Those things creep me out,” Eddie laughed, “it’s the red eyes.”  
  
“It’s not the eyes that get me,” Bill answered, “it’s the weird noises at night.” Eddie hummed his agreement. They bumped gently onto the shore of the island and Bill watched as Eddie pulled himself out, stepping into the water. It hadn’t always been that easy. The first time Bill had dragged Eddie out on water with him he had been basically kicking and screaming. (I didn’t know I was gonna get this _wet_ ,” “I’m gonna fucking fall in, I know it, Bill.”) Bill smiled at the memory of the first time they had gotten themselves well and truly lost, an impressive task on a small, almost totally open lake. Turns out there was just one little offshoot that led to a windy, shallow river. Bill had tried to lead, navigating them further and further from the cabin until they reached a fork. He started to go right until Eddie yelled from behind him.  
  
“Left, Bill, it’s obviously left!”  
  
From then on they didn’t go much further than the island. Calling it and island was generous, it was really the smallest possible piece of land that could still support a small crop of pine trees. Right at the edge two long, low branches stuck out over where the ground turned from moist dirt to dry sand. When Bill and Eddie first found this place they had hunted for thick sticks and pieces of fallen bark to balance across the branches, creating a makeshift roof. Admiring their work, they laughed at themselves.

“Not m-much of a fort.”  
  
“Good enough, though,” Eddie had replied, dropping to the sand to lay underneath it.  
  
“Good e-enough,” Bill agreed, laying next to him.  
  
Eddie had laughed again two days ago when he saw the contraption this year.  
  
“You’re a real architect Bill, you make that yourself?”  
  
“Nah, I had some help.”  
  
Brought back to reality by his boat hitting the sand, Bill hauled himself up after Eddie. They didn’t lay underneath the roof this time, but sat cross legged and looked back towards the cabin across the water. Bill was prone to long, brooding silences. Eddie, typically, was not. His anxious personality pushed him to fill any quiet he might deem awkward. Around Bill, though, he didn’t fidget so much, his shoulders let go of some of their natural tension. They could, and often had, sit in silence the way they did now. Until Bill’s curiosity got the better of him,  
  
“So do you still know anyone from Derry?”  
  
“Nah,” Eddie replied. “It makes sense, though. My mom kept, she... I didn’t get out much.” Bill cringed, if Eddie’s memories were only of his mother then of course he would fill in the gaps by assuming he was just always with her.  
  
“Kind of a shithole anyways, you didn’t miss much.”  
  
“I guess,” Eddie’s voice was quieter now. “Weird though, there’s things I _feel_ like I did there, but don’t actually remember. My memory’s always been shit though, so.”  
  
With a shudder Bill cried out in his head, _bullshit, you remembered the way out of those fucking sewers better than any of us._ He couldn’t help but push, his curiosity getting ahead of him.  
  
“What kinds of things do you feel like you did?”  
  
“Normal stuff, riding my bike, going to the movies. Which I guess I probably _did_ do, either alone or with her, but it still feels like something’s missing, kind of, I dunno, sorry, this is weird.”  
  
“No!” Bill said, too enthusiastically and making Eddie turn to look at him. “Not weird, and uh, if you ever just wanna talk or something, we can, y’know.” Eyes still wide, Eddie nodded slowly.  
  
“Sure, thanks.”  
  
_Dumbass_ , Bill reprimanded himself. Sure, that was some shit you could say to your best friend of almost twenty-two years, not so much to some kid you supposedly met a month ago. He was _not_ going to be the one to fuck this up, he was leaving that up to Richie. It wouldn’t be long, anyways, Bill knew. Richie fell apart a little more every time he was around Eddie, so obviously itching to say something. So Bill would wait, and be there to help put together the chaos after this facade fell apart. He nudged his knee into Eddie’s to get them up and back into their kayaks.  
  
\--

As usual, when the sun set they were set up around a bright campfire, stuffed and satisfied after a “last night feast.”

“Is it time yet?” Bev piped up.  
  
“Time for what?” Eddie asked, just as Richie exclaimed, “Fuck yeah it is!”  
  
“It’s time,” Bill agreed. “A l-little help, Mike?” Mike nodded and stood, following Bill to the nearby shed. Eddie looked around, lost, and repeated his question. Only Ben bothered to answer him.  
  
“Beer pong,” he explained. “Every year there’s a tournament. Really it’s just a pissing contest for Bill and Richie, though. Shocking, I know.” Mike and Bill walked back toward the circle, Mike carrying a couple of big old trash bins that he flipped upside down across from each other. Bill followed with an old door and balanced it on top of the trash bins. Eddie snorted at the makeshift setup, and Richie rounded on him, throwing an arm around his shoulder.  
  
“Not up to your standards, Eds?”  
  
“Eh, I’ve have been dropping those lately anyways,” Eddie retorted shrugging out of Richie’s grip. Undeterred, Richie shouted.  
  
“Alright assholes, team up!” Ben moved to stand beside Bev, pecking her cheek and wrapping an arm around her waist. Bill and Mike were already side by side, pulling the ping pong balls they had also retrieved from the shed out of their pockets. Eddie stayed put, hovering by the fire.  
  
“Oh look at that,” Stan said. “An uneven number, what a shame, guess I’ll have to sit out.”  
  
“And break up the dream team?!” Richie exclaimed, twisting his expression into one of mock horror.  
  
“No, Stan, it’s fine if you want to,” Eddie began, but Stan interrupted.

“Eddie, please, I’m actually begging you.”  Eddie’s eyes shifted to Richie, a little unsure.

“Get over here, Eds, you’re my favorite anyways.” He stuck his tongue out at Stan for good measure.

Eddie’s only protest was that he was absolutely not drinking beer that a dirty ball had landed in, but he was quickly soothed. The cups were filled with water, they would drink out of their own cans when needed. No one mentioned that Eddie himself had suggested the system years ago. The first round went quickly, Bev and Ben half-assed their game and lost the first round to Bill and Mike, shrugging as they walked back to the fire to shoot the shit with Stan instead.  
  
“We’re up, Eds,” Richie yelled, grabbing Eddie’s hand and pulling him to stand in front of the makeshift table. He plucked a ball from a nearby cup and stomped one foot out behind himself, holding a dramatic pose as he brought the ball up to eye level. Across the table, Bill mirrored him, his face deadly serious.  
  
“Denbrough,” Richie deadpanned.  
  
“Tozier. Ready?” Richie began to nod, then froze.  
  
“Wait!” he yelped. He held the ball up to Eddie’s mouth, Eddie leapt backwards.  
  
“What the fuck, Richie?!”  
  
“Good luck kiss!” Richie explained like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Eddie snorted.  
  
“Good try, asshole, no way.”  
  
“C’mon, Eddie, you gotta. At least blow on it or something?” Richie’s face was so earnest, his eyes pleading. With a dramatic sigh, Eddie pursed his lips and blew a raspberry in the general direction of Richie’s hand.  
  
“Perfect! Alright Billy, let’s do it.” Ben’s assessment was spot on, the whole game was little more than a chance for Bill and Richie to take jabs at each other. And drink. A lot. In reality Eddie and Mike were carrying their teams, staying neck in neck while Richie and Bill yelled out nonsense encouragement. Each team was down to three cups, they had each had already downed four beers. Richie and Bill had insisted each cup required half a can, and then finished that last half just for good measure. Richie felt warm and fuzzy, excited and loose. He squawked at Mike has Mike lined up his shot,  
  
“Don’t even bother, homeschool, you ain’t got it,” his favorite southern drawl sounded even better to himself drunk. Mike ignored him, but missed the shot. Bill clapped him on the back.  
  
“D-don’t worry Mike, I got it.” He didn’t. Richie doubled over in exaggerated laughter. Elbowing him out of the way, Eddie picked the ball up from the ground and focused, eyeing the lone cup sitting awkwardly on the left. Richie wondered if he knew he wiggled his hips a little when he adjusted his footing, or that he was almost glaring at the cup. Eddie wound his arm back and snapped it forward. The ball landed neatly in the cup.  
  
“Yes, Eds!” Richie rushed forward and wrapped his arms around Eddie’s waist, lifting him and spinning.  
  
“Jesus Richie, put me down!” Laughing, Richie dropped him down, the tips of their toes close enough to be touching. Forcing his face into a fake scowl, Eddie tried to look angry, but as soon as he tipped his head back and saw Richie’s goofy grin he smiled wide. His cheeks were tinted tipsy pink, Richie wanted to reach up and feel the heat radiating from them.  
  
“Rich, your sh-shot.”  
  
“Fuck off, Denbrough,” Richie called back, still staring down at Eddie almost pressed against his chest. But the interruption was enough to bring Eddie back to his senses, and he twisted in, not out of, Richie’s grip. He faced the other team with Richie’s left arm still around his back. Mike rolled the ball back towards them and Eddie caught it, handing it to Richie’s open hand. Barely daring to move, Richie raised his arm stiff as a board and tossed it, exactly none of his attention on the cups. For the first time in four turns, it actually went in. Eddie laughed.  
  
“Look at that, you _can_ still play,” he turned a shit-eating grin up at Richie.  
  
“Told ya, good luck charm,” Richie squeezed him closer, adrenaline that had nothing to do with the game making him vibrate.  
  
“Whatever,” Eddie rolled his eyes and darted away to retrieve the ball Bill had just thrown that was bouncing towards the forest. Mike took his shot and landed the cup, leaving them 2 to 1, everything leaning on this next turn. Eddie lined himself up, took a deep breath, and paused.  
  
“Hang on,” he rubbed the ball on his shirt and reached up to hold it in front of Richie’s face, smirking. “For good luck.” Richie grinned and gave the ball a loud, smacking kiss.  
  
“Get em, Eds!” Eddie got back in position, eyed his shot, took a step to the right, focused again, and threw the ball straight into the last cup.  
  
“Fuck yes, Eddie!” Richie cheered as Eddie spun around, his arms up above his head, beaming. He leapt towards Richie, wrapping his arms around his shoulders and hugging him. Richie squeezed him impossibly tighter, his fingertips digging into Eddie’s lower back. This time when Richie lifted him, Eddie just laughed and held tighter around his neck.  
  
“Not so fast, assholes!” Bill yelled, “we still get one more shot to challenge.” He was right, but it didn’t matter, they both missed. Richie, high off their victory and off their general proximity, pulled Eddie in close.  
  
“Can’t fuck with the dream team, boys!” He shouted, and ruffled Eddie’s hair, waiting for the rough shove. Instead, he felt Eddie’s thin arm wrap around his waist, then Eddie’s fingers twisting into one of his belt loops. Mike rolled his eyes.  
  
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Richie dropped his arm around Eddie’s shoulder and steered him back towards the fire. When they were standing in front of two camp chairs he stalled, not wanting to dislodge Eddie, whose thumb was (accidentally, probably) teasing at the bottom edge of Richie’s shirt.  
  
“Think fast, Rich,” he jolted at Bev’s voice calling from his left and turned to see a can of beer flying towards his face. It bounced off his hands, raised defensively in front of his face.  
  
“What the fuck, Bev?! Trying to break my perfect nose?!”  
  
“I thought you were paying attention,” she shrugged, then held his gaze and raised an eyebrow. Eddie had jumped away from the commotion, Richie already missed him. Luckily he reached over to one of the chairs and dragged it right up next to the one Richie stood in front of. He fell into it and held his hands up, looking over at Beverly.  
  
“Yes please, Bev.” She cracked the cooler next to her and tossed him a beer. Bill and Mike settled into chairs across the fire, Richie reached down to grab the can by his feet, grumbling as he plopped into his own seat. He held it at arms length as he cracked it open, then rushed it to his mouth to catch the angry foam bubbling from the top. When it calmed, he dropped his arm to the arm of the chair, the scratchy nylon making a funny noise when it rubbed against Eddie’s chair so close beside it. Eddie moved his own arm down, it pressed right up against Richie’s, and that couldn’t be an accident. If anyone ever asked Richie what heaven should look like, he would describe this moment. Surrounded by these six people babbling like idiots, around a roaring fire fighting off the chill, with Eddie Kaspbrak by his side, close enough to touch.

 **\--**  
  
Later, in their room, Eddie crashed onto his bed. If Richie hadn’t watched him down all the drinks he had, he still would have known by Eddie’s telltale giggling. He smiled as he pulled his blanket over himself.  
“It’s cold,” Eddie said suddenly. It wasn’t.  
  
“Sorry, Eds, wanna snuggle up for warmth?” Richie joked.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Wait, what?” By the time Richie actually heard what Eddie said Eddie was standing beside his bed, shoving at Richie’s shoulder.  
  
“Move over.” Richie swallowed, thought of Bev for a second, her warning glare, but scooted up close to the wall. Eddie hummed and slid under the blanket. He pulled Richie’s shoulder down and laid on it.  
  
“Jeez, pretty demanding, you little monster,” Eddie lifted his head, uncertainty creeping through his features.  
  
“Sorry, I thought...do you want me to go?”  
  
“No, Eds, just kidding, lay down.” He did, and was breathing soft and slow, asleep in a matter of minutes. Richie waiting for the waves of longing for more, to be able to touch Eddie, be touched by Eddie, kiss him, fuck him, anything _more_. But it never came. He found himself completely content to be here, next to him. He indulged himself in burying his face in Eddie’s hair and, for the first time in six weeks, fell asleep thinking about now, not then.

**Author's Note:**

> @tozierbraks on tumblr!


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